


i begin to understand why god died

by viscrael



Category: No. 6 - All Media Types
Genre: (it ends happily tho dont worry), Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Angel/Demon AU, Developing Relationship, Heavy Angst, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Mild Gore, Nonbinary Character, Reincarnation, Religion, Slow Burn, Temporary Amnesia, brief emetaphobia tw, brief mentions of alcohol/drinking, but everyones of age + it was only one scene, lots of talk of death and morality
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-08
Updated: 2015-08-26
Packaged: 2018-04-13 17:15:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 49,236
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4530393
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/viscrael/pseuds/viscrael
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em> I was human when my heart was stolen by him, and I was human when I longed to be by his side. This fact won't change, no matter what name I decide to give to these feelings. </em>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>--</p>
<p>It was sometime around 1,200 A.D. when he met Shion.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. the beginning / the end

**Author's Note:**

> a few things abt this fic:
> 
> **1.** any and all of the theology in this fic is Wrong. Wrong as hecky. everything. every last bit of it i pulled out of my ass and not actually from any official religious text. im christian (sort of) but i know Jack Shit abt christian angelology. also, a lot of other stuff in this just sort of . doesnt make sense? the more i read it the less sense it makes but i just Dont Care at this point so. do me a favor and pretend that its logical pls 
> 
> **2.** the story is split up into a couple of different parts: the beginning, the second beginning, the end, and the rebirth. for the sake of how long this fic is as of current (rn its at 33k words, but i have a feeling it will get to be much longer if it continues how im going), the first half of it is the beginning thru the end, while the second half is the rebirth. 
> 
> **3.** ive been working on this since march, maybe april, of this year. i started writing it without the intention of ever going past 3k words, just a short lil au to entertain myself, but i stopped for lack of an ending and let it sit in my folder until june. since then, ive been working on it p much nonstop, at least between other small fics ive been doing, and it escalated dramatically.
> 
> **4.** the fic is in nezumi's pov in case you couldnt tell and nezumi is surprisingly difficult to write, so i apologize beforehand for however ooc anything is
> 
> **5.** i love inukashi and safu with every bit of my gay lil heart, so even tho a lot of this is focused on nezushi, im trying, and have tried, to include more stuff w/ them + their developing relationships with our lovely protags
> 
> **6.** i know the general direction of where the rest of the fic is gonna go but i have none idea with left beef just how long itll take me to finish it so forgive me if the wait is less than satisfactory
> 
> anyway enjoy gay boys

**The Beginning / The End**

 

It was sometime around 1,200 A.D. when he met Shion.

It started out quietly. They passed by each other a few times. They interacted just about as much as you’d think any standard demon and angel would—which is to say, not very much at all. Nezumi got in trouble quite often, messing around with a few other demons. He didn’t remember why Shion was there, why angels were in a mainly demon populated hang out—didn’t they have things to do, people to inspire, humans to blind? Did angels ever do anything except bide their time?

(Later, Shion would look at him with those blinding eyes, unwavering, pure, and ask, unfazed, “Do _you_ do anything but bide your time?”)

Whatever the reason be, it would just so happen that Shion was there, just in time to catch him messing around with someone else. Something or another happened that caused the two to interact. Fate, maybe. Shion’s wonder, more likely. Shion had gotten in the middle of a fight somehow, but when Nezumi was at his throat, only sparing his life because the aftermath was too much of a pain, the angel had only blinked, eyes widening, and excitedly asked how he’d managed to disarm him so quickly. Nezumi didn’t remember much from the encounter after that, except that it was the Beginning. That, and those big doe eyes, filled with childlike curiosity and amazement.

 

\--

 

He didn’t think about those eyes for a long time. It was 1,360 A.D. that he met Shion again. This time, less pleasantly.

Nezumi wasn’t one for following orders or sticking to other people’s plans, but he’d been assigned some portion of Earth to watch over, although “watch over” wasn’t a very fit description. He was to guard it from angels, the war between the Two Sides that’d been going on for about thousands of years then far from over. He had never gotten behind the cause, but it was better than the methodic life he tended to before. Earth was better than one might expect, as much as he hated to admit it. He’d spent his whole life vowing that he didn’t care for humans or their land, but somehow he’d fallen in love with the idea of Earth.

That was the Second Beginning.

Shion was sent to try to persuade him to give up the land—some large portion in the west Nezumi couldn’t be bothered to remember the name of—but it was obvious that he’d been instructed to use force if Nezumi resisted.

“And what’s in it for me?” Nezumi had asked, flicking his tail on purpose because he liked the way Shion’s eyes followed it sometimes, though why he wasn’t sure. He told himself it was because it was fun to mess with the angel, just as gullible and naïve as the first time they’d met, the excited chirp of “ _How’d you do that?_ ” that he’d sworn he’d long forgotten ringing in his ears.

“Less mess,” Shion answered simply. Nezumi barked out a laugh, jumped from the perch he’d made of a tree to be at the other’s level.

“And you believe that’s going to make me give it up? ‘Less mess?’”

The angel before him clasped his hands behind his back—all four of them—and tilted his head to the side, looking much like a cat, and much too knowing. “You seem like the type to take the easier way out, so less of a mess means an easier time, doesn’t it?”

Nezumi couldn’t help it; he started laughing. This guy was…amusing. “You really think you know everything, don’t you?”

“Mm, not _every_ thing,” he said honestly. “But enough to be correct about you, right?”

“If by ‘correct’ you mean that your assumption that I’m just going to give in is true, then no.”

“Either way,” Shion said, making unwavering eye contact, “I’m going to convince you. I just wanted to give you an option that was less hassle, but if you won’t take it, that’s on your shoulders. Not mine.”

Nezumi’s eyebrow twitched. Less amusing now, more annoying. “Isn’t that your job as an angel though? To carry the weight of everything on your shoulders?”

“Angels don’t work the way you think we do. And besides, isn’t the job of a demon to not carry anything at all?” Shion countered. “To not _care_ at all? Supposedly you have no sense of morality. But you’re protecting the humans. Why is that?”

“You’re really annoying me, you know that?” Nezumi drew a small dagger from his bag, and Shion followed suit. When they fought, it wasn’t at all like the first time. It was a close fight, both dancing around each other like they’re meant to, but when Nezumi ultimately managed to disarm Shion, the blade stopped right at his throat, the angel’s arms bent awkwardly behind his back so he couldn’t loosen Nezumi’s grip.

Nezumi found himself in the same position as during the Beginning, his mouth close to the other’s ear, dagger an inch from killing him and still, his hand stopped, paused, didn’t move again. He half expected Shion to come around with some sarcastic or overly blunt comment about his sudden uncharacteristic mercy, but the only thing that settled between them for what felt like forever was silence. Nezumi was in control, but he still found himself holding his breath.

Shion broke it first. “If you’re not going to kill me,” he said, “do you think you could let go of me now?”

Nezumi didn’t move for a moment, before he let out a quiet breath and loosened his grip. Still, he took Shion’s blade and kept it. Later, it would become his preferred weapon of choice.

“We’ve met before,” Shion said after he’d stepped away enough to look at the other, a thoughtful expression on his face. Nezumi only nodded in response before trying to crack a grin, an attempt at seeming less bothered by the meeting than he was.

“You’re better now than you were, what, a hundred yeas ago?”

“Not good enough, apparently.” Shion smiled, and it was blinding. “Why didn’t you kill me this time either?”

“Like you said,” Nezumi tried to answer, voice feeling thick, “less mess.”

The Second Beginning ended when Shion realized that he’d been gone for quite a few hours, and the others would be angry when they found out he hadn’t succeeded. He left with one last look over his shoulder, looking like he wanted to stay, or maybe like he knew that Nezumi wanted him to stay. Nezumi was forced to look away when he disappeared in a ray of light, bright enough to blind him. He was left with a sudden chill and tug in his chest like something rapping on a door.

 

\--

 

Twenty-seven years later, Nezumi still couldn’t get the image of smiling Shion out of his head, bright and curious and amazed at even the slightest lilt in conversation. They’d seen each other two other times between those twenty-seven years, but both times only increased the rapping in his chest, now like something trying to claw its way out.

Nezumi never told any of his friends—although he used the word lightly, as companionship between demons was rare, and the extent that _friendship_ went to was not wanting to kill each other and maybe having a conversation every now and then—about the feeling that grew. If he told them, or even just if he said it out loud at all, there was a chance he would be found out and then he’d be sent to Earth permanently, deemed unfit to stay where he was. and as much as he enjoyed being stationed there, he didn’t want to live there. Earth was beautiful, but humans were horrible, and the repercussions that came with living on Earth for more than a few months made his desire to see the land pale in comparison for his desire to continue living. He wasn’t too keen on being sent to Earth because of a stupid feeling in the pit of his stomach; and even as the feeling built—rapping, rapping, rapping continuously, until it was getting unbearable—he ignored it.

He ignored it for a long time, even by his standards. They saw each other a total of nine times within 600 years, but when he saw Shion the tenth time, he still hadn’t changed, the same blinding smile, the same doe eyes, the same naivety that followed him even closer than a halo would, if angels actually had those.

They didn’t talk. Nezumi saw him staring at him from the other side of the room, eyes intent and heavy and full. Shion didn’t smile when they made eye contact, but it looked like he was repressing the urge to. The girl he was with, another angel, tugged on his sleeve and brought his attention back to her.

The moment ended.

The feeling grew.

 

\--

In the end, only twenty-four years later, Nezumi was stationed to be on Earth permanently—which was as good as being found out, because being on Earth for long periods of time meant his body regressing back to its natural state, until he would eventually become human again. Depending on how long it took, he had about eighty years, ninety if he were lucky. Maybe less, if something sped the regression; and, of course, becoming more human meant he could die of other causes, instead of regenerating.

The End came when he found Shion, bleeding and shaking and covered in blood that looked too red to be angelic. He had wounds wrapping up the sides of his body, his arm, his leg, leading up his neck and snaking around to his cheek, like burn marks, heavy and scarred, his clothes torn where the wounds glowed. His hair was turning white, and the screams that tore through his throat got more hoarse the longer he kept it up; he was losing his voice.

Nezumi wasn’t sure what compelled him to stop the bleeding, treat the wounds, and carry the unconscious boy back to his makeshift home, but that’s what he ended up doing anyway. Shion slept for nearly a week, only waking up every now and then to stare up at the ceiling and mumble something to himself before falling back asleep. Nezumi was nearing two thousand years old, but those seven days felt longer than all the years under his belt combined.

The first thing Shion asked when he finally woke up was, “Where am I?” He was still blinking his eyes open; they were violet now, so unlike the doe brown they had been previously.

“The middle of nowhere,” Nezumi stated bluntly from where he sat next to the bed.

“Wha…Nezumi?”

Said man didn’t respond, instead crossing his legs and flipping through a book he’d already read four times. He’d been living on earth for a while now, a couple of months, maybe even a year, and to someone as old as he was, it felt like days. His perception of time and time passage was starting to adjust to a human’s, but there was still quite a lot of dissonance. Still, the regression had started already. He’d been feeling hunger since the first weeks, and fatigue overcame him like it never did when he was a full-fledged demon. He still had a few perks left over, such as a stronger body, but his tail and claws were gone, and he could feel himself grow weaker the more days passed.

“Why are you…?” Shion started to ask, but he trailed off uncertainly, frowning at the ceiling. He started again. “Are we on Earth?”

“Where else would we be?” Nezumi answered, faking disinterest.

“I…don’t know.” The angel tried to sit up, ignoring the other’s remark of _I wouldn’t do that if I were you_ , only to fall back a moment later, hissing in pain.

“You shouldn’t try to move yet,” Nezumi advised, flipping a page of his book, although he hadn’t really been reading it. “You’re still not in any shape to be getting up; your wounds will reopen if you try anymore than that, and then you’ll be stuck here in pain even longer.”

“Why are you on Earth?”

“Why are _you_ on Earth?”

He didn’t respond for a moment.

“Nezumi,” he croaked.

“Hm?”

“Am I…”

Nezumi didn’t look up, but he glanced at the other from under his bangs. After another moment of silence, signifying that Shion really wasn’t going to attempt his previous question again, he turned back to his book, flipped it shut, and stood up, making his way across the room to get a cup he’d filled with tap water.

He handed it to the other man. “Drink this.”

Shion did so with no comment, gulping it down like he’d never had water before; and, considering his background, he probably hadn’t—or at least hadn’t needed it.

“Why did you help me, Nezumi?” He asked once he’d finished drinking, wiping his mouth on the back of his hand. He seemed to have just realized there were bandages covering his arm, as he stared at them for a moment too long.

Nezumi considered the question for a moment.

“You were screaming,” he said, taking the cup and setting it on the table behind him. “Much too loudly. You were starting to lose your voice, I could tell, and you were bleeding everywhere. When I was trying to help, you kept yelling for me to let you die. Do you remember that?”

The angel’s face was red, like he was embarrassed of his actions. He looked away. “Some of it, yeah.”

“Hmm.” Nezumi busied himself with cleaning up the old bandages and replacing them with new ones. Shion tried to help the most he could, but he couldn’t move much in the state he was in. As the dark-haired man was pulling away, he grabbed his wrist to keep him in place, grip surprisingly firm considering the state he was in.

“You never answered.”

“Isn’t that answer enough, Your Majesty? You were obviously in pain, and I had the resources to help. It’s common sense.”

“But…” he frowned, looking troubled. “You’re a demon.”

“Not for much longer. Give me a couple more months, a year at most, and I’ll be a full, authentic human.”

Shion’s eyebrows furrowed. The news didn’t seem to help soothe him at all. “What?”

“Don’t _tell_ me you didn’t know that one lovely piece of information about demons,” Nezumi said, only half-sarcastically shaking his head.

“I…”

He sighed theatrically. “If a demon stays on Earth for long periods of time, they regress back to a human, with all the lovely perks of a human body, timespan, and emotions. You weren’t taught that, huh?”

“We…weren’t.” Shion responded finally, exhaling like it pained him to realize so. “Or…maybe we were? I can’t remember.”

“Seems unlike you to forget something like that,” Nezumi mused, more to himself than anything.

“I guess so…”

“You should rest some more,” he advised. “You’re still healing. It’s been a week, but those wounds are going to take much longer before you’re in any condition to get up.”

The angel nodded. “Alright.”

“I’ll be sleeping on the couch, since you’re in my bedroom. It’s late, so I’m going to sleep. If you need me, I’m sure I’ll hear you if you call loud enough.” He grinned at the last part, but none of the situation seemed appropriate for grinning.

“Alright,” Shion repeated. As the other man was at the door, just about to close it behind him, he suddenly spoke up, “Nezumi?”

Nezumi stopped. “Hm?”

“Thank you.”

“Don’t mention it,” he said, but he still refused to look at the other. “Goodnight, Your Majesty.”

“Goodnight.”

 

\--

 

Nezumi woke the next morning and immediately went to check on the angel; when he got to his room, the man was awake, crying into his hands.

“Good morning,” Nezumi said as way of letting the other know he was there, seeing as he didn’t seem to notice him come in. Shion didn’t look up and didn’t respond, instead just turning his head away and burying it in his pillow as if that would take back Nezumi having seen him.

The demon didn’t say anything, and when he racked his brain for something to break the ice, to make the atmosphere a little less uncomfortable, he could think of nothing. Instead, he found himself sitting down on the bed and prying Shion’s hands away from his face.

“Shion,” he said, “look at me.”

After a moment, the angel did; his eyes were red and puffy and so, _so_ human, violet and striking and no less beautiful than when Nezumi had first seen them.

“I fell,” was all Shion was able to say before he was crying again, and Nezumi wasn’t sure what made him want to reach out and hold the other, but he wanted to, so he did, and they sat there for a long time, until the sun hung in the sky and it was nearing noon.

When Shion pulled back this time, he wiped his eyes and took a couple of deep breaths, trying to calm himself. “I’m okay now,” he said, but Nezumi got the feeling it was more to himself than anything.

“I have work today,” Nezumi said. “But I don’t have to go in until two. It’s around lunch time now. Do you think you can eat?”

Shion thought about it for a moment before nodding hesitantly. “Yeah. Yeah. Food sounds…good.”

“I’ll be back in a moment.”

Nezumi returned with a tray carrying two plates and two glasses of water, setting them down on the bedside table. They ate in silence, and quite a few times, Nezumi was afraid Shion would start crying again, but each time he bit his lip and continued eating.

“I’ve never cried before,” he said.

Nezumi didn’t look up from where he was eating. “I wouldn’t imagine you had.”

“I’ve never needed someone to comfort me before, either.”

The demon didn’t say anything at that. There was a pause in conversation.

“You’re being really nice to me,” Shion said once he’d finished all his food, setting the plate back on the tray and staring at his hands, still bandaged.

“Do you not want me to be?” Nezumi asked. He checked the time. He’d have to leave soon.

“No, it’s just…I mean…” Shion thought about it for a moment. “Demons and angels aren’t supposed to get along, but…”

The unspoken _but we’re both human now_ hung in the air between them.

Nezumi snorted. “What a completely conventional and predictable way to think. Does it really matter anymore? Would you rather I left you to die? You would have, you know, if I hadn’t helped you. For a day or two, I thought you weren’t going to make it, even with my help, because you were in such bad condition.”

Shion shook his head. “No. I know, and I…I want to live. It isn’t that.”

“Then what is it?”

He smiled gently, a little bitterly. “Habits of thinking, mostly. You think that way for quite literally hundreds of years, and it becomes difficult to think any different—but you didn’t seem to have that dilemma with me at all. Why is that?”

“Oh, no, don’t get me wrong, I had that dilemma—to let you live or die, to save the enemy or leave you to suffer? I thought about it, but figured it didn’t matter here on Earth. The War doesn’t travel over here anymore, not like it used to. And I have nothing to lose anymore, since I’ll be human soon anyways. Might as well help you.” He leaned his chin on the palm of his hand, letting a slow teasing grin spread over his lips. “What would you have chosen, Your Majesty, if it had been the other way around?”

“I would’ve helped you.”

He smiled sardonically. “How noble.”

Shion ignored his sarcastic jab. “Two other times before, you had the chance to kill me, and both times, you chose to let me go.”

“What, getting nostalgic now?” Nezumi stood up, gathering the tray and their shared trash to take it down to the kitchen. “That was a long time ago. We were both really young then.”

“Why didn’t you kill me?”

“Both of those times, I told you the reason why.” Nezumi sighed, making his way to the door. “Less of a hassle, remember?”

“The _real_ reason.”

Nezumi didn’t answer, just leaving the room in favor of putting the dishes away, making sure to take his time. His house was small, just one floor with a few rooms separated by a thin wall, but he was eager to put distance between them for a moment. Once he got back, Shion was lying down on his side, eyes closed and breathing steady, like he was asleep.

The demon pressed the back of his palm to the other’s forehead, feeling his temperature; he was warm. His body was still trying to adjust to being human.

“There _isn’t_ a ‘real’ reason,” he mumbled to himself absentmindedly. “Not anymore than there is a ‘real’ reason I’m stuck here on Earth, anyway.”

He turned away and started out the door to get ready for work.

“You’re stuck on Earth?” Shion called, apparently not having been asleep. Nezumi jumped in surprise before turning back around.

“You were pretending.” He glared.

“Sorry,” Shion apologized, not sounding sorry at all. “But you’re stuck here? Why?”

“None of your business.”

The white-haired man frowned. Neither said anything for a moment.

“I’m off to work.”

Nezumi shut the door behind him a bit too harshly on his way out.

 

\--

 

Somehow, Shion ended up living with Nezumi.

It took another day or two, but eventually, he was able to take his bandages off and move around again; Nezumi walked in on him staring forlornly at his reflection, looking with heavy eyes at the red snake wrapped around his body, curling from his leg up to his cheek. His hair had lost its color, and he ran his fingers through it like he was checking to make sure it was real.

“Personally, I find the white to be quite charming, but we can dye your hair back if it bothers you,” Nezumi had offered, but Shion shook his head and stood up on shaky legs. He nearly fell over, but managed to steady himself on the bathroom sink.

“It’s fine. I’ll just…keep it this way.”

Nezumi shrugged. “Suit yourself. I take it you’re feeling better?”

They made eye contact through the mirror, Shion giving him a small, gentle smile, not unlike the ones they’d shared years before while passing each other. “Yeah, just a bit. I’m thinking about looking around for a job tomorrow.”

“You might want to wait more than a day before job hunting,” Nezumi advised. “Your body isn’t ready for that much strain yet. Slow down a bit.”

“I know, it’s just…” he stared at himself in the mirror. “I feel bad for making you take care of me all on your own when you already have yourself to be worrying about.”

He shrugged. “It’s not that big of a deal, you know.”

“But it _is._ You didn’t have to save me, and you didn’t have to let me stay with you…you easily could’ve left me there to bleed out—even if I _had_ been in the right state of mind to think about saving myself, I doubt I would’ve been able to account for the way my new body works, and the fact that I’m much more vulnerable now. I’m much less resistant, and I don’t think I would’ve remembered in the state I was in that humans need blood to survive. Even outside of that, in all reality, you should’ve kicked me out the moment I could walk.”

Nezumi’s eyes narrowed. “All great points. And what exactly are you getting at, Your Majesty?”

He turned around so his back was to the sink. His gaze was unwavering, eyebrows furrowed as he stared the other down. “What’s your reason for saving me? And I mean the _real_ reason.”

The demon snorted. “Don’t go acting full of yourself; you’re not something special. The only reason I helped you was to repay a debt. And we’re even now.”

“A debt…?” The information didn’t seem to clear up any confusion at all. “What…?”

“You don’t remember.”

“Well, if you would _tell_ me, I’m sure I would—“ Shion cut himself off as his legs gave out under him. He grabbed onto the sink in an attempt to steady himself, but it didn’t do much to help; Nezumi was rushing forward before he could think to do otherwise, grabbing onto his elbow to help pull him up. Once he was steady enough, Nezumi took a step back.

“You’re still not in good condition.”

Shion shook his head, still clutching the basin. “I’m fine.”

“Don’t bother trying to find a job today. It won’t do you any good.”

“Nezumi—“

He didn’t slam the door on his way out, but he sort of wanted to.

_Human emotions are a pain in the ass._

 

\--

 

Both demons and angels alike used to be humans. They lived on Earth, had their own lives and families and memories, but when they died, they were turned into one of the two. It wasn’t a clear split between _heaven_ and _hell_ ; in some cases, they bled over into each other, so that some areas were populated by both of the two classes, thus making it easier for the two to interact. Heaven wasn’t floating on clouds in the sky, and Hell wasn’t engulfed in flames under the Earth. Both were quite similar, to the point where if you weren’t careful, you could end up in either.

Angels didn’t remember who they were before they died. The only thing they were worried about was taking care of their jobs, keeping humans and Heaven safe, fighting the war, the whole stereotypically noble ordeal; but demons were different. Most of them weren’t reborn knowing all their memories, but quite a few were able to remember or regain them as time passed. The purpose for remembering had something to do with torturing them further; after all, demons were evil, and were reborn solely for the sake of suffering more.

Nezumi had always had his memories. He wasn’t sure just how old he was now or what year it was that he became a demon, but he knew that he had been sixteen when he died, swallowed in flames the way his family had been eight years prier. Most of his memories were scattered, just little blips of conversation and people he met and events that took place, but he still remembered his mother, the way she had cared for him so deeply and sang lullabies as he fell asleep, and the way she screamed as she was burned alive, the trees around them being eaten up by red hot flames that licked up his back and left a permanent scar. His whole clan had died that night, with him the sole survivor, the only one who had escaped the massacre.

When you were turned into a demon, you didn’t get a fresh new body, and you didn’t get relieved of all the things you didn’t want to remember; when he looked in the mirror, he could still see the burn marks at his spine like torn away wings.

After the massacre, he had little memory except _starving_ and _disease_ and _suffering_ , but there was one image that stuck out above all else: a boy who could’ve been no older than him, treating a wound in his arm that would’ve otherwise been fatal, either due to blood loss or infection. How he got the wound, he couldn’t remember, but the image of those doe eyes, so bright and unwaveringly caring for what Nezumi was used to, never left his mind.

Even after he’d grown up and taken revenge on the people that had murdered his family, he didn’t forget those eyes.

 

\--

 

“You think I’m the boy.”

Nezumi had just finished his story, albeit leaving out quite a few details, but he’d figured that since Shion couldn’t remember on his own, it wasn’t his fault he didn’t realize what the debt was.

“Tell me, Shion, do angels get new bodies when they’re reborn?” He asked, leaning back in the couch where he sat. He didn’t have much furniture in his makeshift home, but he’d taken the time to make sure he acquired a couch as long as Shion was living with him. They didn’t share the bed.

Shion thought about the question for a moment. “Well…no, I guess we don’t. Of course, a few fundamental things _change_ when you’re reborn, like the composition of your body and the way it functions, making it much more resistant than a human’s and without the need for food or sleep, and, of course, the matter of wings and occasionally extra appendages—“

“You’re rambling again.”

“—But the basic structure is the same, yes. Our faces, body type, hair, and eyes are usually the same as when we were alive, if that’s what you’re asking.”

Nezumi nodded. “In that case, I don’t just _think_ you’re the boy.”

“You’re saying that you are _completely_ sure that I’m him.”

He didn’t nod, but his silence was answer enough.

“Nezumi…” Shion frowned at his hands where they sat in his lap. “That’s…”

“Ridiculous?”

“Well…sort of, yes.”

“Angels don’t get the _privilege_ of remembering their past,” he said sarcastically. “But I did, and there’s no way I could’ve forgotten that. I’ve known you were him for a long time.”

“That’s the reason you never killed me?”

He shrugged noncommittally. “At first, I just didn’t want to kill you. I didn’t know why, but I didn’t want to, so I chose not to. But I realized who you are—were.”

“And you felt like you owed me,” Shion finished for him. “So you brought me in when you found me, after I fell.”

“Yep. And now we’re even. You saved me, I saved you. No more favors need to be had, so don’t go feeling like you need to repay me.” He leaned over and flicked the ex-angel on the forehead for emphasis. Shion rubbed his head and pouted.

“But I would feel weird if you repaid me for something I don’t even remember doing,” he continued to protest. “It still feels like I need to make it up to you, especially considering how much trouble I’ve caused.”

“You can make it up to me by not making a big deal out of it, starting now.”

He blinked. “That doesn’t seem right.”

Nezumi sighed dramatically and pushed himself off the couch. “You and your high sense of morality.”

“It’s not _about_ morality—“

He waved the other off. “I’ll be back in a bit. Try not to make a mess while I’m gone.”

“Where are you going?”

“Out.”

 

\--

 

When Nezumi returned, Shion was asleep on the couch, curled up into a ball with an old blanket thrown over him. Nezumi set a bag of groceries in their makeshift kitchen, which really only consisted of a counter, a sink, and a fridge, and put the food he’d bought away; a couple of cans, some cheese and bread—just a few things to hold them over until Shion could find a job and help with the expenses and keep busy. The town they were in was in quite literally the middle of nowhere, and there were few things around, but Nezumi couldn’t seem to bring himself to be worried about the other finding a job. He was too persistent and too eager to work. Someone would hire him soon enough.

Nezumi considered waking the boy up so he could sleep in their bed, seeing as he wasn’t fully healed yet, but in the end, he sighed and mumbled something to himself about not complaining if he got the better sleeping situation that night. He didn’t deny to himself that part of his reason for letting him sleep was because of the way he looked, peaceful and open and angelic, as ironic as that word choice was, with his white haired splayed around his head like a halo. The image wasn’t much different than from how he normally was, naïve and honest and so predictably _pure_ , but there was a different air around him when he slept verses when he was awake.   

Nezumi sighed.

 

\--

 

“Do you want to know why I fell?”

It had been a couple of weeks since Shion moved in with Nezumi, and since then, he’d found himself a few jobs here and there, cleaning and helping around at businesses, but his most steady one was washing dogs. The residents’ main source of income was still Nezumi, but he couldn’t say Shion wasn’t helping.

The two of them had been eating breakfast at the one small table in their alcove, falling into the rhythm they’d created of teasing banter, only half serious. It seemed both of their bodies were getting accustomed to a human’s body clock, as their sleeping and waking schedules were regulating, and Nezumi was starting to feel like the days were longer—but whether that was because of his regression or the snow falling on the ground outside, he wasn’t sure. Either way, they would need to invest in some warmer clothes soon. They would freeze otherwise.

“Why would you think I want to know?” He finally responded after a moment too long of silence.

Shion stared at his plate. “You never asked, but I’m pretty sure you’re curious. I can tell.”

He was right. Nezumi wanted to know. “You don’t have to tell me.”

“I know I don’t _have_ to, but I feel like it would only be fair. After all, you’re letting me stay with you.”

“If you want to tell me just because you think it’ll somehow make us even, forget it. I don’t want you repaying anything when you have no reason to. We’re already even.”

“No, that’s not why,” he was quick to reassure. “I _want_ to tell you.”

Nezumi stared at the other, trying to gauge if he was lying, and after a moment, leaned back in his chair and nodded. “Okay.”

Shion took a steady breath, seeming to debate how he should go about it. “It’s…I assume you’re aware of the differences in angels and demons, right?”

“There are a _lot_ of differences in case you couldn’t tell, so I’ll need you to be more specific than that.”

“I mean, angels and demons are reborn from humans who’ve passed, and we both keep the same basic body structure, but that’s pretty much where the similarities stop. Angels don’t have the same sort of emotions the way demons and humans do, and we don’t fundamentally _work_ the same way either—if demons are born from hatred and sin, angels are born from—“

“Love and happiness and _purity_ , all that shit. I’m aware,” Nezumi snapped.

Shion didn’t even blink at the interruption. “Right. So the ways our emotions and brain function are different. Humans and demons are actually very similar, in the sense that they can feel a wide range of things, like anger or a sense of justice or pain. Angels don’t have anything close to that. We don’t really feel… _anything_ , most of the time. Happiness, maybe; a sense of tranquility, some times. We don’t get angry at injustices, which makes it easier for us to deliver ‘divine punishment’ and right what’s wrong without going overboard, and all of that that we’re supposed to do. We aren’t meant to remember our past because it makes us…”

“Sinful?”

“Something like that.” His voice sounded uncharacteristically small.

“Alright, so where are you going with this?”

“When an angel begins to remember their past,” Shion was staring at his plate, purposefully avoiding eye contact, “they can begin to regain all the emotions that are normally left for demons and humans—anger, hatred, jealousy, unhappiness, anxiety—anything that an angel shouldn’t, under normal circumstances, be able to _feel_.”

Nezumi could begin to see where this was going.

“It makes us unholy, to feel things like that. When an angel dies, they’re reincarnated on Earth again. Falling is similar, except we get to remain with the memory of our time in Heaven, wishing we could be back there.”

There was silence for a few moments. Shion’s eyes were shining like he was holding back tears.

“I’d seen one other angel fall, in all the time that I’d been reborn. I didn’t think much of it. That was what he got, you know? That’s how we viewed it. It was justice, and it was fair. We didn’t have the capacity to view it as anything differently. It was the natural way of things, the way things were supposed to be; if an angel regained their memory, or went against Him, or did anything to make themselves sinful, they were thrown out of Heaven. It only made sense.”  

“Do you still think that way?”

Shion shrugged. “I don’t know. But I do know that I started…feeling things. Love. And anger. And a sense of injustice. My morals were shifting, changing from what angels considered normal. At first I chalked it up to be nothing but an irregularity; I could fix it, I thought, or if not, it would go away soon. But then I started remembering things…” He smiled at his plate, a little sadly. “Did you know I had a mother?”

“Most humans do.”

“She had dark hair, and she baked, and she sang me to sleep. My dad died when I was little, so it was just the two of us. I was supposedly very smart, and I guess I looked a lot like her, because people told me I did pretty often.

“I was fifteen when I died. I don’t remember how, but it was painful, and my mother was crying a lot. And at the time when I was thrown out of Heaven, I didn’t remember you, but after you brought it up, I started having dreams about a boy I’d met in my other life, when I was twelve or so. He had very quiet eyes, and he tried to kill me when we first met. He didn’t, because I offered to treat his wound.” Shion smiled across the table. “Do you remember that?”

“It was in my arm.” He crossed his arms over his chest, but he felt his expression soften. “Hurt like a bitch, too.”

The white-haired man laughed a little. “Yeah, I would imagine. It’s a very fitting first meeting, don’t you think? The first time I met you as an angel, you tried killing me that time too.”

“You were too curious for your own good.”

“Another thing angels aren’t supposed to be.”

The phrase hovered between them.

“So you fell because you recovered some of your memories, which is considered a huge no-no in Heaven,” Nezumi summarized. “And now you remember us meeting in our other lives?”

“Sort of.”

Nezumi nodded, but there was something that was still bothering him. “How…how long have you been feeling…emotions?”

“Probably since the day I was reborn, honestly.” Shion laughed, but it sounded cold and bitter and human. “I don’t think anyone noticed for a long time, because I kept it under wraps and barely realized it was there myself. Really the only thing I felt at first was curiosity, which didn’t inhibit me from my duties. Once things like anger and injustice started showing up…that was it for me, I guess.”

“So…what was the thing with your scar? And the hair?”

“Punishment.”

“Well, that’s a little fucked up.”

Shion snorted a laugh. “Yeah. And you know what’s funny?”

Nezumi raised an eyebrow to indicate he was paying attention.

“The way things work in Heaven is _really_ messed up, but no one notices it, because we’re too holy to realize it. By angelic standards, it completely fine, but now that I have emotions and human morality, it’s just—it’s _so messed up._ ”

“Oh trust me, I know. Why do you think demons hate angels so much?”

“You’ve been feeling like this since you were reborn?”

Nezumi nodded. “All two thousand years.”

The ex-angel looked down. He stayed silent for a moment, evidently lost in thought.

“Do you regret it?” Nezumi asked in the silence. His voice was quieter than he’d anticipated it being.

Shion looked up from his food, distracted. “Hm? Regret what?”

“Being alive. Getting your memories back. Falling.”

He thought about it for a moment. They stayed in silence like that while he mulled the question over, eyebrows furrowed. Just as Nezumi was beginning to assume he wasn’t going to answer, he shook his head. “No. I don’t regret it. I’m glad I remember you, and you know…” He smiled. “Now that I have them, I don’t think I’d want my emotions gone.”

Nezumi felt his breath leave him. They maintained eye contact for a while. “You’re crying.”

Shion blinked, bringing a hand up to his cheek. “I am?”

The other man leaned over and wiped away a stray tear with his thumb, snorting to himself in a laugh that sounded fonder than he’d intended for it to be.

“You’re really an airhead, you know that?”

The moment ended.

The feeling grew.

 

\--

 

It was winter. The two of them weren’t used to the cold, as most things that were completely new to them, but Nezumi was at least more accustomed to life on Earth than Shion was. He bought them both warmer clothes and extra blankets, but as the days passed and the nights grew longer, even those weren’t enough.

It was Shion’s idea at first.

“ _What_?” Nezumi whipped around, momentarily forgetting he was supposed to be cooking them dinner.

“If we share the bed, it’ll be warmer.” Shion blinked at him in confusion. “I don’t see what the big deal is. Humans do it all the time.”

“Romantically involved humans, maybe,” Nezumi snapped.

“I just don’t see the point in alternating between one of us on the couch and one of us on the bed when the bed is big enough for two people. Plus we’d need less blankets that way, since we’d just share.”

Nezumi sighed. “You’re hopeless as always. But I guess, yeah. It’s better than sleeping on the couch every other day at least.”

The ex-angel smiled, too bright and too pure.

Thus began a different routine, one consisting off sharing body heat and kicking the other on accident. Shion was more than annoying quite a lot of the time (all the time), because he couldn’t seem to understand that Nezumi saying “I’m going to sleep” meant he didn’t have free-reign to just start _talking_. Their body clocks were almost fully on a human’s, so it was even worse than before when Nezumi was unable to sleep.

Their makeshift home was small, so it was a lot of shared space and bumping elbows in the morning while they got ready for the day. Shion had taken it upon himself to handle their financial situations; he was gone for most of the day, even longer than Nezumi, and had four or five jobs he rotated out on. How he found that many and how he kept up with them, Nezumi didn’t know, but it was helping considerably, so he chose not to mention it.

Because of their shared living arrangements, it was only natural that they got more acquainted, exchanging comments over dinner or on the way out. During the day, neither of them talked about their mutual past; they pretended they were normal people, normal _humans_ , living in poverty on the outskirts of a small town populated by only a few hundred.

But at night, things were different; when Shion couldn’t sleep and Nezumi was still awake, he rolled over and talked. He kept talking, about his other life, about his time reborn, about the friends he’d made when he was human and the friends he made when he was an angel.

“I look a lot different now,” he mumbled one night. Their backs were pressed against each other, a sort of faux-reluctance to be near that neither of them really believed.

“I would imagine,” Nezumi said back, voice soft despite no one else being in the house to wake up. “Anyone would look different without the extra arms and wings.”

The sarcastic tone of his voice was ignored, as it often was. “I’m still getting used to having only one pair of arms. I don’t have scars from them.”

“Would you have _wanted_ scars from them?”

He felt the white-haired boy shrug against him. “I don’t know. Maybe.”

There was a lull in conversation.

“Do you have them?”

“Have what?”

Shion’s voice was getting softer the more he talked. “Scars. From when you were…sent here. I don’t think you have a tail anymore, do you?”

“Nah. Too obviously demonic.”

“Mm.”

More silence.

Nezumi sighed. “I do. Have scars, that is.”

The ex-angel rolled over to look at him. “Really?”

“Lower back, yeah. ‘S not a big deal though.”

Even before he said it, Nezumi knew Shion was going to ask, just a little too eagerly, “Can I see them?” so he was already sitting up when the other asked, sighing to himself.

“If I show you, will you go to sleep?” he grumbled, even as he was already lifting his shirt. Shion grabbed a flashlight from beside the table (they hadn’t invested in a lamp yet, seeing as they were mostly out in the day anyway) before helping to lift the shirt up.

Shion was quiet as he studied the scar. Nezumi had seen it in their cracked mirror; it wasn’t a big deal, just a red mark the size of a golf ball on his lower back, along the stroke of his spine. He hadn’t lifted his shirt enough for the other to be able to see his burn marks, as he wasn’t sure he wanted to show those just yet.

He felt a cold hand touch him, and tensed at the contact.

“Sorry, did I scare you?” Shion apologized, but he didn’t take his hand away.

“Don’t be stupid,” Nezumi snapped, but it was lacking in every aspect. He hadn’t had another person touch him without intent to harm since his other life. The contact felt strange, and foreign, and pleasant, and he wanted Shion to _keep_ touching him, and maybe never stop.

Instead, he lowered his shirt and turned around, lying back down with a snapped, “There, see? Not a big deal, so go to sleep.”

Shion laid back down at the order, mumbling a quiet _good night, Nezumi_. He had closed his eyes and was resigning himself to sleep when felt the gentle shake of the boy’s shoulders against his, a clear indication he was crying.

Nezumi didn’t turn around to comfort him, but he really wanted to.

 

\--

 

In the morning, both acted like it hadn’t happened. Still, they repeated the routine that night, of talking about their past when it was dark and cold and they had nothing but their shared warmth and the lingering memories and the ache to go home to guide them—and whether _home_ was Heaven or Hell, or whether _home_ was their past lives, neither knew.

“I wish I had scars from them,” Shion had confessed, muffled into his pillow.

“You have enough as it is. Don’t go wishing for any more. You’d be stupid to do something like that.” Nezumi’s eyes were closed, but he didn’t have any trouble imagining the face Shion would make in response to that; eyebrows furrowed in confusion, violet eyes downcast, curling into himself just a little bit like he did when he was thinking too much.

“It’s…” Shion took a deep breath. “It’s not because I want _scars_ , per say, it’s just…it feels like such a _dream_ , you know?” He choked on the last words, coming out in a harsh, watery, humorless laugh. “Everything from when we were reborn, it feels like it was a _dream_. You—you have proof that you were a demon, that you’d been reborn, that you aren’t supposed to be human right now. You have a reminder. I just have to trust my memories, but how am I supposed to do that when they’re the thing that caused me to fall in the first place?”

Nezumi felt himself grow angry the more Shion spoke. “Yeah, _exactly,_ I have a _reminder_ of me being a fucking demon—I wouldn’t say it’s exactly the best thing to be reminded of.”

Shion was quiet at that. “Nezumi…”

He sighed, harsh and heavy. “Listen, I get that you’re—you’re an _angel,_ of _course_ you don’t get this, you don’t know _how_ to—but trust me when I say that you don’t wish to be in my place. You don’t wish to have been me. The scar isn’t a _badge_ and it isn’t something that’s meant to soothe me and hold my hand like you think it is. It’s a reminder that I’m a _demon_ , or I was, or whatever the hell is happening. Don’t go around saying such selfish things when you don’t even know what you’re saying to begin with.”

They laid there in silence for what felt like forever. Nezumi had started to think he’d gone to sleep when he heard a small sigh.

“You’re right. I’m sorry.”

“Good. Now sleep.”

 

\--

 

“I didn’t know you worked at the theatre,” Shion said one day as a way of greeting, taking his coat and shoes off at the door. “How come you never told me?”

Nezumi shrugged, not looking up from where he was sitting on the couch with his feet propped up on their coffee table, attempting to read. “I didn’t want you to know.”

“Oh.” The white-haired man set the bags he was caring on the counter, pulling out a couple of cans and bread. “It’s your turn to make dinner tonight.”

“Mmm.”

Nezumi was too busy reading to notice the other walking over to him, but he definitely noticed it when the book was snatched from his hands. “Hey!”

“It’s _your_ turn to make dinner tonight,” Shion scolded, setting the book to the side and putting his hands on his hips, before crossing them like he was unsure which to choose. Nezumi had a clear image of what he would’ve looked like had he still had two pairs of hands; one set on his hips, one set crossed. Old habits died hard.

“I heard you the first time, Your Majesty.” Still, the taller of the two stood up and stretched with his arms over his head. “How was dog washing?”

“Messy. Cold.”

Nezumi snorted and made his way over to the stove. “I would imagine. Why are you still coming in to wash them when it’s snowing outside?”

“If _I_ don’t wash them, you know Inukashi won’t, and then their customers will have dirty dogs to curl up with.”

“That isn’t your problem.”

Shion frowned. “It is though. If I choose not to, it’ll be my fault if they get sick. So it’s my problem.”

Ever since falling, Shion had developed some sort of complex about helping others; something to do with his guilt for not having been able to feel angry or sad for others when horrible things happened to them. When Nezumi had first asked about it, he had frowned at his hands and talked about how, when he was stationed on Earth, he had seen countless tragedies: war, famine, death, abuse, rape—the list went on. And even as he saw all of those things taking place, he’d never felt sympathetic or angry for the people who experienced it; he’d only watched. Now that he could feel human emotions, he’d taken it on himself to care for everyone.

It was idealistic, and it was naïve, and it was so _undeniably_ Shion.

“What about you?” Shion said, taking Nezumi out of his thoughts. “How was work today?”

“Boring. Long.”

Nezumi saw him grin out of the corner of his eye. “Rikiga said I should go to one of your shows.”

“That’s a fantastically horrible idea.”

Shion laughed, a clear sound that made Nezumi’s heart speed up. “You don’t want me to come see you perform? Isn’t your first show coming up?”

“I guess so. That doesn’t mean I want you to come see it.”

“I would feel bad missing it, though…”

Nezumi sighed, turning the stove on and getting out a pot to begin making soup, which was pretty much the only thing the two ever had.

“If you’re going to be _that_ concerned with it,” he said, opening a can and pouring it into the pot, “I can give His Majesty his own home performance.” He shot a sardonic grin at the other. “Would that please you?”

The offer was meant mockingly, but Shion actually seemed happy at the offer. He nodded, looking satisfied. “It would.”

Nezumi shook his head. “You’re—“

“An airhead, I know. Inukashi told me to remind you that you still owe them two gold coins.”

“Tell the bastard to get lost.”

“I’ll relay that message tomorrow, but I’m not sure how happy they’ll be.” He smiled before beginning to head back towards the bedroom, yawning. “Call me when dinner’s finished.”

“Don’t blame me if you don’t wake up in time.”

Shion only smiled wider. He closed the bedroom door behind him with a soft _click_.

The anniversary of Nezumi being stuck on Earth was approaching. He couldn’t remember what the exact date was, but he knew it was sometime in April. It was early February now, snow still falling on the ground outside, and it’d been two months since the two had started living together. Shion seemed much more accustomed to Nezumi and his attitude than he did back in December. He was doing much better too; he cried less, and when he talked about his memories, it was with a bit more fondness and a little less grief, although the longing never left his voice. Nezumi couldn’t really blame him. Were he able, he would’ve chosen to be an angel over a human or a demon any day.

But there was nothing either of them could do anymore except get by as they were. They both knew that. Nezumi hadn’t told Shion about the anniversary, nor had he even mentioned how long he’d been on Earth. He was fully human now, just as the other was, and that’s all that mattered at the moment.

Dinner that evening was quiet, but not unpleasantly so; they sat in compatible silence while they ate. When they were done eating, Shion took both of their bowls to the sink and started washing them. They only had a few bowls and plates, so cleaning their dishes wasn’t much of a hassle, but Shion usually ended up doing it most of the time anyway. Whether or not it was because he still felt like he owed Nezumi, the other didn’t know, but he didn’t question it. It seemed too mundane a task to make a big deal out of.

That night, Shion rolled over so he was facing Nezumi in their shared bed.

“Our bodies are used to a human schedule,” he said, like he was commenting on the weather.

“Correct you are. Which would be why I’m tired as fuck and you should go to sleep already.”

“You do this every night, Nezumi, I _know_ you don’t ever fall asleep right away.”

“Only because you keep me up every night,” he grumbled, but he said no more, which was as much of a _go ahead_ as Shion was going to get.

“Our bodies are getting used to human time and life span,” he continued. “The days feel a lot longer than they used to. And I know it’s only been a couple of months since I fell, but it feels like way more than that.”

Nezumi nodded, just making out the outline of the other’s expression in the dark. Two violet eyes trained themselves on a spot on the cover.

“In Heaven, months felt like days. Nothing much happened in that short amount of time, not enough to be significant at least. I always liked visiting Earth every now and then, because every time I went, it seemed so _different_ , like the seasons changed over night.” He seemed to smile at the memory. “Now it feels like they take forever.”

Nezumi snorted. “I wouldn’t mind getting out of this frozen hell myself.”

The comment brought a laugh from Shion. “Yeah, I can’t say I disagree with that.”

“Are you happy?”

Shion halted. “What do you mean?”

“I mean exactly what I asked. Are you happy?”

He frowned. “I can’t really tell what qualifies as _happy_.”

“Try.”

The white-haired boy thought about it for a moment, biting his bottom lip and alternating between wringing his hands and clenching them, those old habits still present. “I guess...” he started. Nezumi waited patiently.

“I guess I was like that in Heaven at some point—happy, I mean. But I can’t remember what it felt like, so maybe I wasn’t as happy as I thought I was.” He was still frowning.

The two waited in silence for a moment. Nezumi found himself scooting closer in the bed, the overwhelming urge to _touch_ hitting him like a truck. He threw an arm over Shion’s waist and pulled him closer so his nose was buried in that white hair.

“Nezumi…?” Shion asked, sounding confused but not upset.

“Just let it happen,” he mumbled, voice muffled as he was still pressed against the other. “Think about the question. It’s fine if you can’t come up with the answer tonight; just tell me in the morning. But I’m going to sleep, because I had a long day and I’m tired as fuck, so g’night.”

He heard the smile in Shion’s voice when he said, “Alright. Good night, Nezumi.”

Nezumi was already half asleep when he felt the other melt into him and mumble, “I think…that the answer is probably yes. Yeah. I’m happy.”

 

\--

 

Shion never explicitly said it out loud, but Nezumi could tell that he hated the scars that wrapped around his body.  
“It looks like a snake,” he’s said one day after having passed a mirror while they were walking around town at the market. He stared at his reflection, scowling with eyes just a bit too sad. Nezumi tugged on his wrist and told him to keep moving or he’d get trampled by the people behind them.

That afternoon, when they got home, he said, after passing the other looking disgustedly at the mark on his arm, “You don’t seem too happy with those.”

“Hm?” Shion looked up and then back at where Nezumi was pointing to his arm. “Oh. Yeah, I guess I can’t say I am.”

He thought about saying something sarcastic, something mocking to lighten the mood, or to get on his nerves, or whatever it was he was hoping it would achieve—but the words wouldn’t come, and even when the phrase formed in his mind, it got stuck on his tongue. The topic was too serious; the scars were too much of a reminder to Shion of what he used to be, of what had transpired, and he looked so genuinely _upset_ about having them there to remind him that it felt cruel to make a joke of it.

What came out of his mouth instead was, “It’s your turn to cook tonight,” before he turned and walked back to the bedroom, cursing himself quietly for not having said something different.

 

\--

 

“You were at the show tonight,” Nezumi stated rather than asked as he walked in the door, throwing his jacket off with more force than needed. He was less than happy.

Shion smiled sheepishly, rubbing the back of his neck. “You caught me.”

“Did Rikiga take you?” The taller man asked just a bit less harsh than intended, taking his shoes off and heading to the stove to heat up left over soup. They weren’t able to eat dinner together tonight, as Nezumi had been at his show, and evidently Shion as well.

“No. Inukashi did.”

He quirked an eyebrow at the news. “ _Inukashi_ took you? To one of _my shows_?” He snorted a laugh. “Sure.”

“Rikiga got the two of us tickets,” he continued, ignore the comment, “but something came up and he wasn’t able to come. I gave the other to Inukashi, and they came with me.”

“And I’m sure they had a blast.” He poured his dinner into a bowl and shuffled around to find a spoon before plopping down on the couch unceremoniously. All he wanted to do was eat his dinner and then go straight to bed.

“They seemed to like it, actually!” Shion’s eyes lit up as he retold their night, something about how Inukashi was a “good friend” to go with him to something like that; apparently they hadn’t felt like letting Shion go by himself and risk a shady place like that. That part Nezumi could believe, but there was no way Inukashi had stayed for more than ten minutes of the show.

Shion shrugged. “They did! Oh, but I have a feeling it was just because I was there, and they didn’t want to leave me alone.” He smiled fondly at the memory. Nezumi couldn’t help but to notice that he was much more open in expressing positive emotions than he used to be.

“So you saw the show, huh.” Nezumi took a spoonful of his dinner and leaned his chin on the palm of his hand. He was more angry about the whole ordeal than he was letting on, but it was getting easier to let things go these days; when he was a demon, every negative emotion burned so much _brighter_ and lasted so much _longer_ than they did now that he was human. There wasn’t much he could do about Shion having seen him now. And in any case, he wasn’t ashamed of it.

“Yeah.” Shion nodded. “You were amazing.”

Nezumi grinned a little sarcastically. “Be careful with your compliments, Shion. You might inflate my ego even more if you keep this up.”

“I’m serious though, you were amazing. I didn’t know you could sing so well.”

“What, you’re saying you’ve never overheard me in the shower?”

Shion shrugged. “You sing to yourself sometimes, yeah, but it’s different from on stage.”

Nezumi nodded like he understood, swallowing another spoonful of soup. “And what ever happened to me giving you a ‘home performance’?”

The ex-angel raised an eyebrow in challenge. Somehow, it did nothing to take away from how naturally innocent he looked.  “You only said that because you didn’t want me to go.”

“Not true.” Nezumi leaned back where he sat, propping his feet up on the table. “What if I had everything all planned out already, huh? And you just ruined all my hard work.”

Shion smiled, too honestly happy with the banter. “You wouldn’t have needed to plan anything anyway, since you already had to memorize your lines for the play…unless you were counting on doing something special just for me.” The last part was said with that same smile, although now it looked challenging.

“Did you _want_ me to do something special for just you?”

“If it were okay with you, I think I’d like that.”

They sat in silence for a few seconds, neither breaking eye contact. Finally, Nezumi had to look away under the weight of his gaze, somehow sultrier than he’d seen him before, and it occurred to him suddenly that Shion was _flirting_ , and it was working a bit too well.

“Well.” he stood up, having finished his meal, and brought his bowl over to the sink. “As much as I would love to do that, it seems I can’t as of now, seeing as you went to the show anyway.”

Shion pouted, bottom lip jutting out. “Next time, then?”

“Next time,” Nezumi promised.

 

\--

 

“Do you regret it?”

Nezumi’s hands stilled where he was pulling a shirt over his head. He thought about how to respond for a moment. “Regret what?”

“Your other life,” Shion said, like it was an obvious answer. He was sitting on the bed in their room, watching the other change while the two of them got ready for the morning.

Nezumi pulled his shirt off, tossing it on the bed before putting a clean one on. “What made you ask that all of the sudden?”

“I don’t know. I was just wondering.”

“Usually people don’t ‘just wonder’ about something like that. And if they do, they don’t actually ask it.”

“You don’t have to answer.” Shion crossed his legs where he sat, sitting with his hands in his lap. “It was only a question.”

Nezumi sighed and said nothing as he finished getting dressed. While he was putting on his shoes, he finally responded, “A little.”

The other boy perked up at his voice, waiting to see if he would say anything else.

“I don’t regret how I acted and how I spent my life, as short as it was. Obviously, I wish I hadn’t been…”

“Reborn,” Shion finished.

He nodded. “Yeah. Reborn. And if I had to be, I can’t say I would’ve minded being an angel.”

“I’m not sure it was all it was cracked up to be,” the white-haired boy mumbled.

“Mm.”

They finished getting ready in compatible silence. As they were leaving the house, Nezumi asked, “Do _you_ regret it?”

He thought about it. “Not much. I regret leaving you, but even when I was dying I don’t think it ever crossed my mind to be sorry about how things turned out. If anything, I just wish I had been there for my mother more. I have no idea what happened to her after that.”

“So you don’t wish you hadn’t fallen?”

“At first I did, yeah.” He smiled. “But I think I’m okay now.”

 

\--

 

They fought.

Nezumi was naturally hot-tempered, and Shion too optimistic; their views too different and morals too skewed. Neither said it, but it was clear that they were opposites, almost too greatly so. They were, in simple terms, incompatible, and had been since the start.

It wasn’t new information. Nezumi knew that. Shion had to have known that. They were opposites in the most literal of ways, from the very beginning; but there had been a peace that settled for the months following their descent that led them to believe it was okay. They argued often, just little banter that was only half malicious on Nezumi’s side and still managed to bounce right off Shion, but it was never anything serious. It was never something that truly _hurt_ either of them.

Nezumi had been in a bad mood, and they’d fought—over what, he couldn’t remember. Something mundane, something irrelevant; a comment Shion had said in passing, something idealistic and ignorant about the nature of the two. It wasn’t important, and it shouldn’t have caused a big fuss.

They didn’t talk for three days after that. Nezumi wasn’t nearly as upset over the exchange as he was letting on, but Shion wasn’t saying anything, and it was easy to pretend he was still angry about it for a day or two longer than he was, just for the sake of ignoring confrontation. He was, after all, an actor.

Shion didn’t cry over it, but when they slept, he rolled over and refused to face Nezumi for the first time in weeks. Their backs didn’t touch. Shion shifted away if they ever did. He had spent two thousand years getting used to being alone and avoiding physical contact, but now that he’d known what it felt like, it felt so much worse to have it be taken away again all of the sudden. But Nezumi was anything if not stubborn, and he refused to give in and apologize first.

The fourth day rolled around. Their mornings were spent in silence. Shion didn’t so much as look at him. They didn’t say goodbye on their way to work.  

Inukashi must have noticed that Shion wasn’t acting so much like himself, because they showed up at Nezumi’s work that afternoon, right as he was getting off and getting ready to go back home.

“What the hell did you _do?_ ” They demanded, hands on their hips.

Nezumi finished wiping his lipstick off. “That would be easier to answer if I knew what you were even talking about.”

“Oh, cut the bullshit, you know _exactly_ what I’m talking about!” They were right. He did know. “What the hell did you do to make Shion so goddamn upset?!”

“I didn’t _do_ anything,” he snapped, standing up and throwing the wipe in a trash bin. He talked as he drew his hair up in a bun. “We got in a little argument, it’s no big deal. I’m just letting him cool off for a while.”

Inukashi rolled their eyes, blowing a strand of hair away from their face. “Sure, a ‘little argument.’ I’ve seen you guys get in arguments before, but he just laughs it off and says it’ll be fine by the time he gets home. He hasn’t said that in, like, three days. What did you _say_ to him?”

“It’s none of your business.” He pushed past them irritably.

“It is if it’s going to affect Shion’s work.” They followed him. “I’m not paying him to look upset and sulk the whole damn day.”

“You’re barely paying him to begin with.”

“And _you’re_ changing the subject.”

“How he acts when he’s at work isn’t any of my concern.” He shrugged his jacket on and started out the door, waving at his manager to signal he was leaving. Inukashi followed them for a moment, before stomping their foot and throwing their hands in the air in exasperation.

“Ugh! Ok, fine!” They huffed. “At this point, I’m not saying it as his employer, but—Shion’s my friend, alright, and I care about him—“

“Oh? How interesting. I didn’t realize you were capable of that.”

“Shut up, bastard. My point was, I care ‘bout him, and you really fucked with his head or something, because he’s been acting _weird_ —and not, like, _Shion_ weird, like _weird_ weird.” They looked down, arms crossed grudgingly. “And you don’t have to tell me what it was you fought about or whatever the hell, but just make it up to him. If you care about him at _all_ , you’ll get off your damn high horse and apologize for once.”

They started down the alley, headed towards their hotel. “And if he’s not okay by tomorrow, I’m kicking your ass!” They called.

Nezumi sighed.

_If you care about him at all_ …

“That’s the whole damn problem, though, isn’t it?”

 

\--

 

When Nezumi got home, Shion was already there, lying on his back on their couch, staring at the ceiling and mumbling to himself.

Nezumi frowned, momentarily forgetting that they were supposed to be mad at each other. “What the fuck are you doing?”

The ex-angel titled his head back so he could see the other, and blinked. “Why’re you upside down?” His words sounded slurred.

Nezumi stared at him a moment. “Don’t tell me you’re _drunk_.”

“What?” Shion’s eyes widened. “No. ‘F course I’m not drunk.” He stayed silent for a moment. “Am I?”

“What, did you go out with Rikiga again or some shit?”

“Mm,” he hummed, seeming to think about it. “I don’t think I did. I saw him a little bit and went back to his house, but—“

“That’s exactly what I meant, airhead. This’s just… _fantastic_.” Nezumi sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. “So, what, he got you drunk? Let me guess, he offered for you to work for him too.”

For some reason, Shion laughed at that. “No, of course he didn’t do that. I think—I think Rikiga thinks I’m a saint or somethin’; he was reluctant to give me anything to drink to begin with. I don’t think he thinks I’m even capable of something like sex.” He frowned suddenly. “An’ anyway, aren’t—aren’t you supposed to be angry at me? You haven’t talked to me in _daaaays_.” He rolled over on the couch so he was lying on his stomach instead, pouting. “’S a long time.”

“I came to apologize, actually, but now that I’m thinking about it, I don’t think I will,” Nezumi grumbled, taking his jacket off and beginning to walk back to the bedroom to sleep and _not_ deal with a drunk Shion.

“Aww, what? No, c’mooon, that’s not fair!” Shion pushed himself off the couch and followed after the other. “Why’re you takin’ it back?”

“Because you’re _drunk_ and I’m not about to apologize to you like this. That’s bullshit.”

“Why’s it bullshit?”

“I’m not sure if you’ve noticed, but I’m not too big on saying sorry, so I’d rather not the only time I do it be while you’re falling over yourself.”

“I am _not_ —“ He tripped over the door’s threshold, cutting himself off. “Okay. I’m _mostly_ not falling over myself.”

Nezumi ignored him, feeling a headache coming on, and sat down on the bed, kicking his shoes off and beginning to get changed to sleep. He wasn’t very hungry or in the mood to deal with any more bullshit.

“You _know_ ,” Shion started, sitting on his side of the bed, legs criss-crossed, “I’ve been—I’ve been alive, I guess that’s what you say? Are angels alive? Well, I was an angel for, like, a couple thousand years an’—“

“We were like that the same amount of time, dipshit,” Nezumi interrupted.

The white-haired boy pouted. “ _Anyway._ I was like that for, like, a _long_ time, but angels can’t get—get inebriated, ‘cause I dunno, body composition and stuff, so I never bothered trying wine or alcohol in the first place.”

“Are you going anywhere with what you’re currently saying or are you just spouting absolute bullshit?” Nezumi snapped.

“So I’ve never gotten drunk before!” He continued like he hadn’t heard the outburst. “And it’s not really that great? I don’t get why Rikiga does it all the time. Anyway—I had a point to what I was saying, I’m pretty sure. I think.” He flopped on his back on the bed, looking at the ceiling.

Nezumi continued changing in silence, pulling his shirt over his head to throw a clean one on.

“Mm, Nez’mi?” Shion mumbled, sounding like he was about to fall asleep, but he was staring at the other very intently. Nezumi paused what he was doing and glanced at him from the corner of his eye, feeling self-conscious under the violet gaze. He turned away and grunted in way of letting Shion know he was listening.

“When—when I was an angel, I didn’t get to…to feel stuff, y’know that?” His voice sounded small.

“I know.”

“But I’m human now, so I get to feel all _sorts_ of stuffs, like being drunk, for ‘xample.” He giggled, and Nezumi felt him scoot closer on the bed.

“Congrats,” he mumbled, feeling arms wrap themselves around his waist, keeping him from putting his clean shirt on. Still, he didn’t move away.

“Angels only get to feel happy, sort of…” His ‘ _s_ ’s were slurred. “But I can get angry now. An’ upset. An’ anxious. I can feel love and jealousy and sadness and—and—you get the point.”

Nezumi felt Shion’s arms tighten in a hug, pressing his forehead into Nezumi’s shoulder. “Before I met you, I didn’t know what it was like to feel all of that stuff…I was defective, I guess—as an angel, I mean—‘cause even…even before I fell, I think I was in love with you.”

The other didn’t say anything in response.

Shion continued. “Y’know, if we had stayed together in our other lives—if we hadn’t died so early an’—an’ if we’d stayed friends—I would’ve fallen in love with you then, too, I think. I think I always would’ve fallen in love with you. I think that no matter what, I would’ve fallen in love with you, over and over again.”

“You’re throwing those words around again,” Nezumi said through clenched teeth. “You don’t know what those mean, the weight they carry—”

“But I do!” he protested. “I _do_ know what they mean! I only feel this stuff because of _you,_ Nez’mi, and I’m not…I’m not exaggerating or imagining any of this…” His voice cracked. “Don’t tell me everythin’ that’s happened between us has been…has been my imagination…Don’t you dare say that…”

They sat in silence for a few moments. Shion’s shoulders were shaking. Nezumi turned around on the bed so he was facing the other and lifted his head up to face him.

“Shion,” he said. “It’s nothing to cry about.”

The other blinked up at him in confusion. “Then why are _you_ crying?”

“I’m…” Nezumi brought a hand up to his cheek; felt the tears there. He smiled bitterly. “Well, that’s bullshit.”

“What?”

“Nothing,” he dismissed. “We should talk about this when you aren’t drunk.”

“I’m only a _little_ drunk,” Shion insisted. “Tipsy’s a better word.”

“It’s bed time. Go to sleep, Shion.”

“Okay.” He grabbed Nezumi’s hands in his and didn’t let go. “You’re sleep’ng too.”

Nezumi sighed. “Yeah. Okay.”

 

\--

 

Shion must’ve woken up first, because Nezumi stirred to grumbling and muffled cursing.

“Aww, hell…” Shion mumbled, his arms tightening around the pillow he was hugging. He groaned into it. Nezumi shifted his arms around the other as a signal that he was awake.

“’Don’t hear you curse very often,” Nezumi commented groggily. Shion shifted in his arms so they could face each other.

“My head is _killing_ me,” he groaned. “Do we have any Asprin?”

“In the bathroom. ‘S probably not much left though.”

Shion wiggled his way out of the other’s grasp and disappeared into the bathroom. He returned a moment later, tipping his head back to swallow the pill, grimacing after it was over and throwing away the paper cup he’d used for water.

“I hate taking pills,” he complained, climbing back into their bed. It was too early for either of them to start getting ready for the day. Nezumi half-hoped that Shion didn’t remember anything that had happened with him last night, but considering the fact that he wasn’t pulling away from contact, Nezumi was probably hoping in vain.

Sure enough, just as he thought they were going back to sleep, Shion said, voice quiet, “You never _did_ apologize, you know. And I’m sober now, painfully so.”

Nezumi snorted into the other’s neck. “You’re right about that.” He felt himself frown unintentionally. “I’m sorry about what I said.”

“…Which time?”

He shrugged. “All of them, I guess.”

“We still need to talk about last night.”

“I’m forbidding you from ever going out drinking with Rikiga again.”

It was meant as a joke, but Shion didn’t laugh. “You know what I meant.”

They stayed silent for a few moments. Nezumi sighed. “So I take it that means you remember everything, right?”

Shion nodded.

He sighed again. “What do you want to talk about first, then, Your Majesty?”

“Why do you keep refusing to believe that I’m in love with you?”

Nezumi barked a laugh. “I thought that one would be obvious. We’ve only known each other for six months.”

“We’ve known each other _much_ longer than that and you know it, Nezumi.”

He didn’t say anything. Shion sighed and turned around so they were face to face.

“Why were you crying last night?”

“I wasn’t.”

“Nezumi…”

“I don’t know why,” he admitted finally. “Human emotions are bullshit anyway.”

“You don’t like them,” Shion observed.

He smirked sarcastically. “No shit.”

“Nezumi,” Shion said. “I’m in love with you.”

“You’re not.”

“Stop _saying_ I’m not!” He sat up abruptly, eyebrows furrowed in frustration at the other. “Stop acting like you know what I’m feeling better than I do!”

“You’re just new to the whole ‘emotions’ thing,” Nezumi continued. “You’ve only just gotten yours, but I’ve had mine since I was reborn—“

“And it was, what? Anger? Hatred? Distrust?” Shion’s voice was rising, his hands running around in a flurry as he talked, body still trying to make up for the lack of gesticulation from only having one pair of arms. “I _know_ how demons work, I’m not ignorant, and I _know_ that it wasn’t things like love and trust and comfort that you were feeling, it wasn’t the _good_ things, you’ve told me that enough. It was all the bad stuff, I know that, but you keep forgetting that I’ve _had_ emotions! I had them before I fell! I’ve felt like this about you since before you found me!”

Nezumi sat up himself. “What do you know about things like love? You lived all of your years in luxury, and sure you couldn’t get _angry_ at shit, but we’re not talking about _anger_ , Shion. We’re talking about love, or whatever it is you think you’re feeling for me—which, when it comes down to it, is just fascination,” he sneered. “You’re just a little kid who’s jumping to conclusions about someone you feel like you _owe_. It’s the novelty of it. I could be anyone.”

Shion turned his head away, refusing to look at the other. His eyes were staring at the sheets in front of him, his hands clenched. “What do _you_ know about things like love, then? You’ve never felt it. I know you haven’t.”

“You don’t know—“

“See! There you go again! There’s your hypocrisy!” He threw his hands in the air. “I can’t _possibly_ know what you feel, but somehow you know exactly what I’m feeling. I can’t feel love, but you can. I can’t know how the world works, but _you can_. That’s bullshit, Nezumi, and you know it is. You’re making excuses.”

“I only say that because it’s true. You’re a kid, you’re so damn easy to read—“

“You don’t think I know you as well as you know me.” His voice was surprised, apparently having just made that revelation.

“Of course I don’t. It’s true, isn’t it? You wear your heart on your sleeve; you never think about what you say, you’re too idealistic for your own good, you think that everyone is somehow—“

“You talk in your sleep.”

Nezumi stopped. “What?”

“When you’re having a bad dream, you talk in your sleep. Sometimes you say my name. I try to wake you up if it looks too bad, but you usually calm down when I hold your hand, so I figure it’s okay.”

He willed himself to not get embarrassed. “Thank you for telling me, Your Majesty, but what does that have to do with anything?”

“You grit your teeth when you’re annoyed, but not when you’re angry; you clench your fists if you’re really pissed off, like you’re ready to hit who ever it is you’re talking to. You laugh when things aren’t funny because you think it’s ironic or because you’re being pessimistic. You’re scared of me saying that I’m in love with you. You’re only so vehemently denying that I know anything about my own emotions because if I do, then that means that I really _do_ love you; you’re scared of rejection, and of being hurt, and of growing attached because you know that things can be taken from you so easily. But I don’t think you actually want me to not be in love with you, do you? I think you love me back, but you don’t want to admit it, not to me, and not to yourself.”

Nezumi couldn’t find his voice. He wanted to respond, to scream, to yell, get angry, and say, _you’re wrong about me, Shion, I don’t care about you. None of that is right; you’re all wrong, you’ve been wrong this whole time, you don’t know anything about me._ But the words wouldn’t come. They got stuck in his throat like the time he tried to make fun of Shion’s scars. They felt petty, and wrong, and he couldn’t say them, no matter how hard he tried.

He wasn’t sure when Shion had gotten so near, but suddenly his face was impossibly close to his, close enough to feel his breath on him, close enough to see his eyelashes, white and beautiful and fluttering half-closed as he leaned in. “Tell me if I’m wrong, Nezumi,” he said. “Tell me I’m wrong, that you don’t want me to do this, and I’ll stop. Tell me.”

Nezumi didn’t tell him.

 

\--

 

Shion leaned in.

Nezumi let him.

 

\--

 

“Hey,” Inukashi barked.

Nezumi barely glanced at them. “I’m at work. Go away, unless you’re here for the show.”

They ignored him completely. “What did you say to Shion?”

“I thought you weren’t going to ask about it as long as he started acting normally again,” he responded, stuffing his hands in his pockets moodily.

“I _said_ I wasn’t gonna ask what you fought over, but you obviously haven’t apologized yet, so I want to know what’s such a big deal that you can’t get off your ass and say you’re sorry already.”

“What makes you think I haven’t apologized?”

They scoffed, rolling their eyes. “I’m not _stupid_ , ya know—“

“Could’ve fooled me.”

“—And Shion’s still acting weird.”

He stayed quiet for a moment, busying himself with taking his hair down and shrugging out of his jacket before sitting down in the chair in front of the mirror, cracked and dirty but still in use. “I already apologized.”

They snorted. “Sure ya did.”

“Believe what you want, but I did, this morning actually. I was going to last night, but when I got home from you yapping at me, he was drunk—“

“ _What_?”

He didn’t flinch at the raised voice, only shrugging in response. “He went out with Rikiga, apparently.”

Inukashi’s jaw clenched. “Of _course_. What else could you expect from Rikiga, the greedy fucking asshole.”

“What, protective much? You get _that_ worried about Shion, huh.”

“I’m _not_ protective!” They snapped. “You think Rikiga’s an asshole too, so I don’t know where _you’re_ getting off from!”

“Watch your word choice there.”

“Shut up!”

“Anyway, the point is: I apologized already, so you have no reason for coming to yell at me again. I did what you told me to, so I don’t get why you seem so eager to fight me. You know you’d just get kicked out right now, seeing as I’m at work, and supposed to be getting ready right now.”

They growled low in their throat, obviously less than pleased at the comment. “I don’t care if you apologized, because whatever it was you did just ended up messing with Shion _more_ , which is the _opposite_ of what you were supposed to do.”

Nezumi turned around in his seat so he was facing the other, reaching a hand up to grab their chin in his hand and pull them forward so the two were nose to nose as he talked.

“What, you’re worried about Shion? You care about him? I thought you were the one who was supposed to not have any attachments, isn’t that right?” His voice slipped into a higher pitch; it was a woman’s voice, deceivingly sweet and maternal. “Caring about people only brings you down. Don’t you know that by now, little one?”

They jerked away from his grip angrily, face red. “Oh, that’s rich coming from _you_. You care about the weirdo even more than I do, you damn hypocrite. And Shion’s…Shion doesn’t deserve to get dragged down by you. He cares about you—not that I can see _why_ , considering how much of an asshole you are. He’s too damn naïve for his own good, and if you aren’t careful you’ll end up like he is.” They glared at him.

Nezumi smirked, voice returning to normal. “That won’t happen.”

“It already has.”

The smile left his lips, his eyes narrowing dangerously. “What exactly are you getting at?”

“You’ve already lost, Nezumi. You let yourself get affected by him and now you can’t shake him off. That’s your own business if you set yourself up to get hurt—frankly, I couldn’t give less of a damn. But you better not hurt Shion in the process.” They turned around, voice low. “You’ll _really_ be the naïve one, then.”

Nezumi didn’t say anything as they left the room, the door slamming shut loudly behind them. He sighed into the silence that followed, thinking about what they’d said. His eyes narrowed.

“I’ve already lost, huh?”

 

\--

 

Shion got home after him that night, as he’d had something to “take care of,” as he’d put it, before he left work. They ate dinner in silence, both avoiding eye contact. When it came time to do dishes and Nezumi went to work on them without being prompted, Shion stared at him for a good couple of seconds before sighing.

“Nezumi, we should talk,” he said.

“Last time we tried to do that, it ended up making things worse,” Nezumi quipped. “We’d be better off not opening that can of worms, don’t you agree?”

“I _don’t_ agree, actually.” Even without turning around, he knew Shion was frowning, always so predictable.

But, no, that wasn’t it; he wasn’t predictable at all. Nezumi wasn’t sure what he was getting himself into half the time, still living with someone like Shion and even going as far as to form an attachment. He doubted he could’ve broken off from the other boy at that point anyway.

He’d done this to himself, and now it was too late to go back.

Might as well plow on forward.

“How come you didn’t push me away this morning if you were just going to stay quiet all day and ignore me?” Shion continued, none the wiser to Nezumi’s current predicament.

Nezumi didn’t turn around to answer. “I was giving you time to think things through and work stuff out on your own. More confrontation would’ve just made it worse. In fact, I think it’s currently making things worse, but you’re going ahead anyway, against what I’ve already advised.”

“So how long were you planning to give me to ‘work stuff out’?” Shion didn’t sound angry, but his tone was tense, inquiring.

“A day, maybe two. However long you needed,” the other responded coolly, rinsing off the last bowl left and wiping his hands on a dishrag. “But you seem eager to start things now.”

“You always let things _fester_ ,” Shion said matter-of-factly. “You’ll let things like this sit on the back burner for as long as possible, until you can’t ignore it anymore. But I don’t want to ignore it, and I don’t want you to ignore _me_. I don’t regret what I did, and I don’t take back what I said—I meant, and still mean, all of that. Would it make you more comfortable if I chose different wording?”

“’I love you’ has too many connotations already attached to it,” Nezumi replied, turning around finally to face the other and tossing the dishrag back on the counter. “Too many preconceived notions about it and the people exchanging the sentiment; wouldn’t you agree, Shion?”

Shion blinked and seemed to think about how to respond for a moment. “It’s got certain connotations, yes, but I’m not sure any of them are false to what I’m feeling. It seems like the best word choice I could’ve come up with at the time.”

“But now that you’ve had time to think about it, have you thought of anything better?”

He shook his head in a no. “I stick by what I said, Nezumi. I do love you, and I don’t wish I hadn’t kissed you, although you’re sort of acting like you think otherwise.”

Nezumi pointed to himself faux-innocently. “What, me?” He smirked. “Now why would I regret something like that? I’d say it was as good a kiss as any. Although I could’ve done with it being not so early in the morning.”

“So…” The white-haired man bit his lip in thought; he was shifting subtly where he stood, like he did when he was worried or nervous. “You’re not angry about me kissing you?”

“Trust me when I say that if I hadn’t wanted you to, I would’ve stopped you.”

He let out a puff of air, somewhere between a relieved sigh and a laughed-huff. “Yeah, on that one I can say I trust you.”

“I am, however, disappointed.”

Shion looked up, blinking in confusion at the comment. “Disappointed? About what?”

The other grinned, less hostile than usual but just as teasing. “Was that the best you could do, Your Majesty? Don’t tell me that was your first kiss.”

Shion stared at him for a second, eyes wide and mouth just the smallest bit open like a surprised fish. Nezumi could almost _see_ his brain processing the comment, and once he did, his face heated up in a blush until it disappeared behind his scar. “Angels didn’t…find enjoyment from things like romantic or otherwise intimate relationships, and by the time I’d been reborn I was still only fifteen…” He scratched his cheek, like he was embarrassed.

Nezumi stared back before the information hit him and he burst into a fit of laughter. “Oh my God, you’re serious? That was _seriously_ your first kiss?”

“It’s not that funny!” Shion defended, expression that of an angry puppy. “What do you expect? Angels don’t naturally have anything close to romantic or sexual attraction!”

Once he’d calmed his laughter, he straightened up and put on a more serious, albeit still teasing expression, one hand on his hip. “Seems I’ll have to teach you then, huh.”

“Teach me?”

“Of course!” He made some over-exaggerated, sweeping hand motion. “It only makes sense, doesn’t it? I’ve had experience with this kind of thing, so I should help to teach you.”

Shion raised an eyebrow, leaning his weight on one leg, apparently over his previous embarrassment. “I’m not sure how great of a teacher you’ll be.”

Nezumi felt himself smile, pleased that he was going along with it. “You haven’t seen me try yet. This morning was different; you caught me in the worst possible time.”

“So if I kissed you right now, it would be different?”

“Oh, absolutely.”

“Hmm.” Shion clasped his hands together behind his back, faking thinking about it. “I’ll hold you to it.”

The kiss was mutual this time, their height difference causing Nezumi to lean down and Shion to lean up. He was just as gentle, just as hesitant as he was the first time he kissed Nezumi, but the taller led this time, bringing his hands up to cup that white hair, and after a moment, Shion seemed to grow braver.

They pulled away. Shion’s face was red.

“Was that any better, Your Majesty?”

“I—I don’t have much to compare it to,” he answered, voice a little heavy like he was distracted, “but I think I can say that it was.”

Nezumi smiled and leaned down to brush his lips against the other’s cheek gently, just the smallest bit teasing. “Does that mean you want me to do it again?”

Shion nodded eagerly. “Yes.” And then, as an after thought: “Please.”

“As you wish.”

 

\--

 

Nezumi came home one night bleeding and covered in bruises.

“Welcome home—Nezumi!” Shion cut his greeting off by his own outburst, rushing up from the couch and to the doorway where the other man was standing, leaning against the frame. “What happened to you?”

Nezumi waved him off and tried to say nonchalantly, “Nothing, just something after work,” but his voice wavered and he was still leaning against the frame for support, so he doubted it was at all convincing.

Shion raised a hand to his cheek, brushing over a bruise that was beginning to form on the top of his cheekbone, nasty and purple. Nezumi had hoped his companion would be asleep, or at least falling asleep so he wouldn’t notice his condition. He hadn’t wanted to worry him, but from the way Shion’s eyes were wide and anxious, mouth open in shock, it was too late for that.

“I’m fine,” the taller tried to say reassuringly, setting a hand over Shion’s and lowering it from his cheek so he could hold it instead. He squeezed it in a way he hoped was comforting, but if it was Shion didn’t respond to it. He blinked away tears.

“We have to get you cleaned up,” he finally said once he’d gotten over his shock at the situation, blinking rapidly like he was still trying not to cry and gently tugging Nezumi in the direction of the bathroom. Nezumi didn’t resist the contact, and obediently sat on the closed toilet seat while Shion shuffled around dazedly to find the First Aid kit. He pulled it out from under the sink cabinet and opened it, going to disinfect the cuts.

“You don’t have to do this,” Nezumi protested, but it sounded weak. He hadn’t ever seen Shion looked so worried about him, and frankly, he was afraid of making the situation worse by saying something wrong.

“I want to,” Shion answered, voice thick. “Let me get some ice for your bruises. Don’t move while I’m gone, okay?”

Nezumi nodded and watched him disappear into the kitchen; he was alternating between wringing his hands and clenching his fists, like he did sometimes when he was nervous, and when he came back with a bag of ice, his eyebrows were furrowed in worry.

Shion cleaned him up in silence for a few minutes.

Finally, he bit his lip, and asked what had probably been bugging him the whole time, “What happened?”

“Stage accident,” Nezumi lied, and, of course, since it was Shion, he saw right through it.

“Someone hurt you.”

The hairs on the back of Nezumi’s neck stood up; he’d never heard Shion sound like that, so genuinely _pissed_. He’d heard him angry before, mostly at him, but not once had it sounded like this.

He didn’t try to deny the claim, only staying silent as Shion washed off the dried blood that was dripping from a cut on his forehead. Nezumi winced when he brushed against an open cut.

“Who was it?”

It was less of a question and more of a demand.

“I don’t know.” It wasn’t a lie this time. “Some guys that I’d seen staying around after the show.”

“And they just—they just _attacked_ you?!” Shion’s fists clenched, voice racing in anger.

“I’m fine, Shion, it’s not a big deal,” Nezumi tried to placate him, laying a hand on one of his clenched fists and gently opening it so he could trace the lines on his palm.

“Of course it’s a big deal—they hurt you!” Shion’s voice didn’t lower, but he let the other trace his palm, and his eyebrows were furrowed more in worry now than anger. “They can’t just get away with that…”

“And what do you suggest I do, huh? Call the police?” Nezumi snorted. His words sounded harsh, but he ran his thumb over Shion’s knuckles in perfect juxtaposition of what he was saying. “Like they’ll care at all. They can’t do jack shit, Shion, and there’s not much else I can do.”

The white-haired man looked down, frowning with eyes a little too shiny. “I can’t just let them…let them hurt you like this…” He was quiet after that, biting his lip and blinking rapidly once again; still, a tear made its way down his cheek.

Nezumi brushed the tear away, smiling gently. “I know what you’re thinking. Don’t go doing something stupid like getting yourself hurt over me. Besides, I wasn’t totally useless; I think I broke one guy’s nose.”

Shion snorted in a laugh, leaning into the hand on his cheek. “Alright. I won’t do anything.”

“Promise me.”

He nodded and raised his hand, offering his pinky. “I promise.”

They hooked pinkies, and it was a deal.

Shion seemed to feel a little better after that; he went back to cleaning Nezumi up, apologizing any time the other winced at a particularly bad bruise, and when they were done, he leaned up and kissed him on his swollen, cut lip. “I’m glad you’re okay,” he all but whispered.

“Can’t say I don’t agree with you.”

“Next time you have a show, am I invited?”

“You don’t want a private one?”

Shion smiled. “I’d prefer both, if possible. Besides, it’d be fun to go see you. I like spending time with Inukashi.”

“Don’t let them hear you say that. They’d get embarrassed and overly defensive to compensate.”

He laughed, the quiet sound something that Nezumi had the privilege to hear more often now a days. “Oh, I’m aware. I don’t think they like me saying out loud that we’re friends.”

“Mm,” he hummed distractedly, only half paying attention to the conversation as he set his hands on the other’s hips, pulling him closer by the hook of his jeans.

“Nezumi,” Shion said, just as the other was about to lean down and kiss him.

“What?”

“You need to rest.”

He huffed. “I’m fine.”

“Your work ran late, and you’ll never heal if you don’t get any sleep.”

“Ugh,” he groaned. “It’s not a big deal.”

“Nezumi.” Shion was using his “no nonsense” voice.

Said man huffed in irritation, but complied anyway. “Fine.”

Shion smiled, a little triumphantly. “Great! Now come eat dinner before we go to bed.”

Still, Nezumi didn’t miss the way his expression returned to a worried frown on their way out of the bathroom.

 

\--

 

Shion’s scars weren’t like normal scars.

There were times where, whether it be the middle of the night or while he was walking around town, they would start burning again, like they had the night he’d gotten them, and to Nezumi it almost looked like they were fresh again—but he could never touch them to check that hypothesis, because Shion was always withering in pain, screaming again like he had been when Nezumi found him, and it was like they were forced to relive that night—for what reason, Nezumi didn’t know. He wasn’t sure he wanted to know.

Inukashi was scared, to put it lightly, when it happened one day while Shion was working. Nezumi hadn’t been there, but when Shion retold the story, he smiled a little sadly when he talked about Inukashi’s reaction; they didn’t know what to do, and Shion wasn’t in his right state of mind from the pain, so he’d not been much help to calm them down. In the end, their dogs ended up helping Shion more than they really could, curling up next to him and licking his wounds until he stopped yelling.

They’d cried.

Nezumi didn’t believe that when he heard it. Inukashi didn’t cry. They weren’t as detached from people as they thought they were, but they still didn’t _cry_ ; in all the time Nezumi had lived there with them, they hadn’t even cried when one of their dogs died, and they considered those dogs their family.

But Shion wasn’t really much for lying or exaggerating things, Nezumi knew that, and so it had to be true that Inukashi, for once in their life, cried over someone else.

“They were—panicking a lot, and I think I passed out. When I woke up, I was in one of their hotel rooms, one of the unoccupied ones, and they were there with Rikiga. They actually…they hugged me when I woke up, and they were crying. Rikiga was, too, though.”

Nezumi smiled a little sardonically. “And here they were, getting on my ass on being attached to you when they were doing that themself.”

Shion blinked. “What makes you think they’re getting attached to me?”

“Inukashi doesn’t cry _or_ hug anyone, much less both for the same person. You’re one of a kind, you are. Managed to screw over both of us.”

He frowned. “I don’t think that’d be screwing you over.”

“Inukashi and I both know that trusting and caring about people is almost always a death sentence.” Nezumi shrugged. “Nothing we can do about it now.”

“So does that mean that you screwed me over?”

Nezumi looked over at him. “What?”

Shion’s gaze didn’t waver. “I care about you _and_ Inukashi, but caring about people gets you hurt. Does that mean you screwed me over?”

“If you want to think of it as going both ways, then sure,” Nezumi said, looking away. “What did you end up telling Inukashi about what happened?”

“Nothing, really. I couldn’t really tell them anything without explaining everything, so I just sort of said that I wasn’t ready to tell them. They got angry after that, though…”

“They’ll get over it.”

Shion frowned, thinking about something. “Do you think we could ever tell them about…us?”

“No.”

The answer was immediate. Shion looked up. “How can you be so sure?”

“We’re human now, but that doesn’t mean we can just _tell_ people about us. Inukashi would hardly believe you if you tried to tell them, anyway. If anything, it would freak them out and cause them to withdraw—which would help them, really, so sure, go ahead and tell them. Just don’t mention me, if you’re so set on it.”

“Nezumi,” Shion said, voice stern, “I don’t think this is going to be a one time thing—my scars already done this twice now, and what happens if it does it again while I’m with them? They’ll want to know, and I’ll have to tell them _something_. I can’t just keep saying that it’s a secret and expect them to deal with me while I’m…” He trailed off, left the unspoken _screaming in agonizing pain, out of my right mind_ open in the air between the two.

“Do you have any idea why this is happening in the first place?” Nezumi asked.

“I don’t…” the white-haired boy frowned. “I have a theory, sort of, but it’s not much to go on, and I don’t know how accurate it actually is.”

“Let’s hear it.” Nezumi crossed his legs and leaned back on their shared couch. Shion shifted where he sat next to him and rubbed the back of his neck.

“It’s probably not right, but I have a feeling that it’s supposed to be a reminder of what happened to me. I think…I think I’ve gotten too used to the human world, and I like it a little too much, even though that isn’t the point in falling. The point is to suffer and regret what I did, but I’m not suffering, and I don’t regret it. But if I had something like this—reliving what it felt like to fall—every now and then periodically, it could change how I feel.”

“So, you’re saying this could be a regular thing.”

Shion nodded somberly. “If I’m right, this’ll be a thing until I start hating Earth, and wishing to go back to Heaven. And I have a feeling that it won’t exactly care for where I am when it starts.”

“You could potentially have this happen at any time.”

“Potentially,” he agreed. “But if there’s a pattern to it, then I can predict when it’ll happen. The first time it happened was while I was asleep, right? How long ago was it?”

“Two weeks, I think.”

“Then right now it probably goes in two week intervals. It’ll have to happen a few more times before I can actually come up with anything, but hopefully this won’t…be as big of a deal as we thought it was.” He smiled optimistically.

“You’ll still be in excruciating pain. Planning for it doesn’t change what it feels like.” Nezumi frowned. “And if you’re right, wouldn’t the intensity of it change depending on whether or not it’s making you hate Earth?”

He shrugged nonchalantly, like the news wasn’t bothering him. “We’ll have to find that one out.”

“And you’re…not bothered by this? At all?”

“No, I am.” Shion was still smiling even as he said that. “But I’m just going to have to deal with it until we figure something out. I don’t think anything can make me hate how I am now.”

“You like being human.”

“I like being with you,” Shion corrected.

“So you would be okay being an angel as long as you were with me?”

“I think I would be fine being anything as long as I was with you.”

Nezumi looked away, those eyes too blinding even now. “You make no sense to me, you know that?”

Shion smiled widely. “I think I make more sense to you than you want to admit that I do.”

“Not to mention that head of yours has only gotten bigger since living with me.”

He blinked. “Really? I’d thought I just got more confident.”

“There’s a thin line between confidence and arrogance,” Nezumi said, standing up from the couch and stretching. He didn’t ignore the way Shion’s eyes followed the line of his shoulders and the strip of skin exposed when his shirt raised.  
“Oh, of course.” Shion grinned. “You walk it quite often, don’t you?”

Nezumi narrowed his eyes. “Be careful what you say, Your Majesty.”

“Even if what I say is true.”

This time he couldn’t quite keep the small, satisfied grin from spreading. “Not only has the prince gotten a bigger head, but he’s also gotten better at comebacks.”

“You call me ‘prince’ and ‘Your Majesty’ a lot,” Shion noted, changing the subject suddenly. “Why?”

“Oh, come on, you can’t say it doesn’t fit you perfectly.” He held out a hand to help the other up from the couch. “So noble and naïve, like royalty.”

Shion smiled and took the hand until they were both standing, but neither moved. “As much as I like you calling me that, I think I would probably like it more if you tried calling me by my name more often.”

“As you wish, Your Majesty.”

Shion raised an eyebrow at his snark, but followed him out the living room into their shared bedroom.

Still, when he was falling asleep, Nezumi felt himself mouthing “Shion” against the other’s shoulder.

 

\--

 

“Your bruises are almost all gone,” Shion noted one morning while they were getting ready. Most days, Shion would wake up first, get dressed, watch as Nezumi got dressed himself, and then they would eat breakfast together.

Nezumi didn’t really mind the way the other stared (it was a bit flattering, if he was being honest). He pulled his shirt on over his head. “It’s been two weeks. I would hope they would be.”

Shion hummed in agreement, and Nezumi felt him shuffle off the bed before there were arms wrapped around his waist and a head against his shoulder blades, nuzzling into him tiredly.

“Hey.” Nezumi set his hands over Shion’s. “I can see that big head of yours thinking too much. I’m fine. Stop worrying about me.”

“Have those guys come back?” His words were muffled.

“No. I haven’t seen either of them since then.”

It seemed to reassure Shion a little, because his shoulders relaxed and his arms shifted so they were less stiff around Nezumi’s torso. “Okay. Good.”

“You need to stop worrying about me,” Nezumi mumbled. “You should put some of that energy into caring about yourself.”

“I _do_ care about myself,” Shion said. “I just care about you too.”

“Mm.”

Shion must’ve thought it important that he got the point across to the other; he moved out of his position and came to stand in front of Nezumi instead, so he could look at his face. “Nezumi,” he said, setting his hands on his cheeks gently. “I can care about both of us. You can too.”

_Your heart is too big._

What came out of his mouth was, “I know.”

“People don’t have to choose between caring about others and caring about themselves.”

_I’m not a person. Not really._ “I know.”

Shion kissed him, but it was a little sad, like he knew what Nezumi was actually thinking. “I love you.”

“I know.”

“You’re sure you know?”

He nodded. “I’m sure.”

“I can see that big head of yours thinking too much,” he parroted, offering a smile. “You keep going about things like you’re still a demon, but we’re both human now. It’s okay to care about others, and it’s okay to care about yourself.” He laid his head on the ex-demon’s chest. “Angels had to care about others; demons had to care about themselves. But we don’t have to choose here. You shouldn’t treat it like it’s the same set of circumstances.”

Nezumi wanted to say _I know_. He didn’t say anything.

Shion pulled away and kissed his cheek. “I’m going to be late for Inukashi’s if we don’t hurry. I’m sorry.”

Nezumi shook his head. “It’s fine. Let’s just go have breakfast.”

 

\--

 

There was a mutual understand that neither of them did anything beyond kissing. The one time they’d gotten carried away, Shion’s scars had acted up, sooner than they’d expected, and he’d spent the next half hour trying not to claw his throat out from the pain; Nezumi had spent the next two hours tending to him, as they’d started getting accustom to. It didn’t hurt any less, but Nezumi knew what helped and what made things worse through trial and error, so it was better than nothing.

One night during dinner, Shion set his spoon down and said, “I think my theory was correct.”

Nezumi looked up at him from where he was eating. “Oh?”

“And I think that things—things like kissing, touching, pretty much anything, um,” his cheeks were pink, “anything intimate—makes it worse.”

“How so?”

“It…” he scratched the back of his neck. “I think it makes me less…likely to start hating Earth.”

Nezumi wanted to smirk, say something sarcastic about what a compliment that would be to him, but he couldn’t find it in him to do so. “So being with me is making you hurt more.”

“No!” Shion was quick to answer. “That’s—that’s not it at all, I just…I think that’s why, the other day when, um…”

Even with the solemn atmosphere, watching Shion get flustered over talking about the fact that they’d made out was amusing. They were two thousand years old and he was still a blushing virgin. “That’s why your scars started hurting,” Nezumi finished for him.

Shion nodded. “Yeah.”

“Okay.” Nezumi took a sip of his drink. “Then we don’t do that anymore. It’s not a big deal. We weren’t exactly doing anything before anyway.”

“Well, um…” Shion swirled his spoon around in his bowl, which was apparently very interesting. “I sort of wanted to—if you wanted to, also, that is.”

“To, what? Have sex?”

He glared at the other, obviously annoyed that he’d right out said it when they’d been tiptoeing around the phrasing the whole conversation. “I mean—yeah. I did. Er, do, I guess.”

“Even though it’ll likely make your scars hurt more?”

He nodded decidedly. “But only if you were okay with it.”

“Oh, no, don’t worry about me, I’m okay with it.” Nezumi leaned his chin on his hand, elbow propped up on the table. “I just don’t want you to get hurt over something as fleeting as sex.”

“I won’t get hurt.”

“If you have sex with me knowing that it’ll make your scars burn worse, it’ll be what hurt you.” Nezumi frowned. “I don’t want to if that’s the outcome.”

“But you’d want to outside of that.”

“Right.”

Shion nodded. “Then let’s have sex.”

Nezumi gave him a look. “Were you not listening to anything I just said at all, airhead? I don’t want to hurt you.”

“You won’t be the one hurting me,” the ex-angel corrected.

“You’re so one track minded sometimes, you know that?” He sighed and got up from the table, taking both of their empty bowls over to the sink and setting them down. “Are you going to try to convince me to sleep with you?”

He felt Shion shake his head from behind him. “No. If you say you don’t want to, I’m not going to push it. But I really do want that, and I think it’d…I think it’d be worth it, even though there’s a chance it’ll hurt me later.”

“And you’re sure that your scars won’t burn in the middle of it?”

He thought about the question for a moment. “Theoretically they could, but I don’t think they will. It happened the other day already, and it still goes by two week intervals, so we should be fine.”

Nezumi snorted. “You sounded pretty sure of yourself.”

“I am.”

He turned around to face the other, leaning back against the sink with his arms crossed. After a moment, he sighed and pushed off from where he was leaning, heading towards the bedroom. “Well, come on then.”

Shion blinked. “What?”

Nezumi didn’t respond, but heard the other’s footsteps following him a moment later. He smiled despite himself.

 

\--

 

“You called me by my name.”

Nezumi curled up deeper in the covers, grabbing the sides and wrapping Shion in them too so they were cocooned in blankets and pressed chest-to-chest. “Hm?” he mumbled sleepily. He could already feel himself drifting off.

“You called me my name,” Shion repeated, and after a moment, the words registered and Nezumi blinked at him.

“What, did you not want me to?”

“No, of course not. I love it when you say my name.”

“Then what’re you talking about it for?”

He shrugged and laid his head on the other’s chest, closing his eyes. “Usually you just say ‘Your Majesty.’ It just…it made me happy.” He smiled against Nezumi’s collarbones. “To hear you say it made me happy.”

“Go to sleep, Shion.”

“I love you.”

Nezumi didn’t say it back, but he had a feeling that Shion knew anyway.

 

\--

 

“Tell me what’s wrong with Shion.”

Nezumi blinked at the doorway where Inukashi stood, dripping wet. It had been raining all that weekend, so Shion had gotten the day off, and was currently asleep in their bedroom.

“What?”

Inukashi tried to push themself inside, but Nezumi pushed them back. “You’re covered in mud and you’re not about to get my whole house wet.”

“I need to talk to you,” they insisted.

“You can talk here.”

They huffed in annoyance, glaring at him, before giving in. “Fine. Is Shion here?”

“He’s asleep.”

“Good. Now tell me what’s going on with him.”

“I’m going to need more information than that,” Nezumi said, leaning against the doorway.

“You know what I’m talking about!” Inukashi insisted, still glaring. “The other day, when he was at work and got hurt…” they trailed off, voice getting smaller at the memory.

“Oh, I heard about that,” he commented. “I heard you cried into Shion’s arms once he woke up, isn’t that right?”

“Shut up! I thought he was going to die, give me a break!”

Nezumi snorted. “You’ve never acted like that with anyone else. Could it be you’re in love with him?”

“As if,” they snapped. “And stop trying to change the subject. I know you know what that was about and what it was—and Shion refused to tell me, even though I was the one who had to deal with that…”

“You’re bitter because he couldn’t tell you something incredibly personal to him?” Nezumi clicked his tongue. “Sounding more and more like you _are_ in love with him, if you ask me.”

“I _didn’t_ ask you, and I have a right to know when he’s the one who just fell on the ground and started screaming in the middle of washing my dogs!”

Nezumi’s smirk disappeared, and he pushed off the doorframe. “I can’t tell you.”

“And why the hell not?!”

“Because it’s not my story to tell. Also, keep your voice down. You’ll wake him up, and I doubt he’d be too happy knowing you’re going behind his back.”

Inukashi’s eyes widened. “I’m not—I’m not going behind his back!”

“Oh, but you are. You’re coming to me to find out something about him that he refused to tell you, while he’s asleep nonetheless. Seems to fit the definition pretty close, wouldn’t you say?”

“Shut up!” Inukashi looked away, crossing their arms. “It’s just…”

Nezumi’s frown faltered. As much as he hated to admit it, he sort of sympathized with Inukashi; he remembered what it felt like the first night he’d found Shion, and he remembered all the times recently that he’d had to deal with it. It was scary as all hell, but it was easier for him because he always knew that Shion was going to be okay.

Inukashi didn’t know that.

“You’re worried about him; I get it,” Nezumi mumbled. “But Shion will tell you when and if he’s ready. I’m not going to tell you for him.”

“But you _do_ know what it was.”

“I do,” he confirmed.

They nodded, scowling at the ground. “Can you at least tell me whether or not it…it can kill him?”

“It won’t kill him,” Nezumi reassured. “He just has to endure it.”

“Okay.” They nodded again. “Okay.”

“So if that’s all you wanted to bother me about, you should leave now.”

“Why, is he waking up?”

“No, I just don’t want you standing dripping at my doorway.”

“Fuck you!”

 

\--

 

Shion woke up an hour later, shuffling into the living room with a yawn. Nezumi looked up from the book he was reading on the couch.

“Good morning, Your Majesty. Did you sleep well?”

“Mm,” he hummed groggily. “What time is it?”

“Almost three. You were asleep for quite a while.”

Shion rubbed his eyes and made his way to where Nezumi sat, plopping down next to him and leaning his head against his shoulder. “I’m sleepy.”

“You shouldn’t be,” Nezumi said, flipping a page.

“I couldn’t sleep last night.”

“So it would seem.” He tried to focus on what he was reading, but it was difficult when he could feel eyes trained on him, watching as he read. After five or so minutes of the two sitting in silence, with Shion staring as he flipped another page, he sighed and dog-eared where he was in the book, glancing at the other irritably.

“Did you want something?” He asked impatiently.

“You have the day off,” Shion observed.

“I do.”

“Did somebody come by earlier?”

Nezumi glanced at him. “What do you mean?”

“I woke up a little bit earlier and heard you talking to someone before I fell back asleep. I didn’t know if someone had come over or if you were just talking to yourself.”

“What would make you think I was just talking to myself?”

The ex-angel gave him a look.

Nezumi rolled his eyes half-heartedly. “Yes, Shion, someone came by.”

“Who?”

“Inukashi.”

Shion blinked. “Inukashi did?”

“That’s what I just said, yes.”

“What’d they come by for?”

Nezumi shrugged. “Getting on my ass about money again,” he lied.

“You still haven’t paid them back yet, have you?”

“I’ve been busy.”

Shion stuck his tongue out teasingly before shifting where he sat so that he was all but sitting in Nezumi’s lap, wrapping his arms around the other’s neck and nuzzling into his shoulder.

“Would you happen to be in need of attention, Your Majesty?”

Shion huffed. “I haven’t seen you all day.”

“And whose fault is that, huh?” Despite his words, Nezumi kissed Shion back when he leaned in expectantly. They stayed like that for a while, sharing body heat on the couch and listening to the rain pounding outside while they kissed leisurely. Shion sighed into his mouth and pulled back, pressing their foreheads together. He’d managed to wiggle his way around so he was straddling Nezumi at some point while they were kissing.

He had just opened his mouth to say something when he faltered, blinked his eyes open hurriedly, and yelped, slumping his body forward so he was pressed against Nezumi’s, clutching at the fabric of his shirt a little too hard. Nezumi knew what was happening; his scars were acting up again. He cursed loudly and picked Shion up to repeat the familiar process.

Still, his heart raced just as badly as it did the first time.

 

\--

 

“You’re thinking too much,” Shion observed a couple weeks later. They were at Inukashi’s, Shion in the middle of washing one of the older dogs, while Nezumi sat and watched him, for lack of anything else to do. It was Saturday, and he didn’t have anything until a dress rehearsal later that night, so he was killing time at Inukashi’s.

“What makes you say that?” Nezumi asked, leaning back on the palms of his hands, tilting his head as he watched Shion take off his gloves, the dog he’d just finished cleaning shaking its fur in an attempt to dry itself.

“You’re not very good at hiding it when you’re worried about something,” he explained. “Although, to be fair, I can’t ever tell _what_ you’re thinking about; just that you’re thinking too much.” He smiled. “Wanna talk about it?”

“Hell no.”

“I figured as much.” He sat down next to the other, sitting with his legs folded under him. “Is it about my scars?”

“We shouldn’t talk about that here.”

Shion blinked in confusion. “Why not?”

“Inukashi. They’re a horrible eavesdropper.” He said the last part loudly, and heard the sound of a door slamming in response, no doubt in his mind that he’d succeeded in letting them know he’d heard them trotting around trying to act like they weren’t paying attention.

“But it is, isn’t it?” Shion continued, ignoring the small exchange. “You’re worried about them. They haven’t hurt as much lately, if that’s what—“

“It’s not that.”

“Then what?”

Nezumi looked down. “It’s nothing,” he mumbled.

“It’s obviously _something_. Are you worried because they’re getting more frequent?”

“No, that’s—“

Another door slamming, and this time a man stormed out of the hotel, looking pissed off, most likely at some poor business decisions Inukashi had made. He grumbled as he stormed past, not even paying the two of them any mind. Shion didn’t say anything more until he was out of earshot.

“There’s no point in pretending you’re not bothered by something, Nezumi,” he said, gently.

“I’m not _pretending_ anything, it’s just not a big enough deal to bother you over.” He shrugged. “Stop worrying about it. I’m fine.”

Shion gave him a wary look before finally sighing in defeat. “Sometimes I wish you weren’t such good of an actor. It makes it difficult to tell what you’re thinking.”

Nezumi stood up, smirking. “Well, if you’re done for the day, shall we go, Your Majesty?”

 

\--

 

“I told Inukashi.”

Nezumi set his glass down, eyes narrowing. “Told them what?”

There was a moment of silence. Nezumi got a sinking feeling that he knew what Shion was going to say even before he opened his mouth and a small, “About us,” came out, voice steady but his hands shaking.

“About...us,” Nezumi repeated.

Shion nodded, still not turning around from where he stood at the stove.

“What exactly did you tell them?” He was struggling to keep his voice level, already feeling anger starting to bubble, but he kept it down to hear what the other was going to say.

“Most of it. I told them about what we...used to be, and I explained the scars…”

“And you mentioned me.”

“I…” He faltered. “I hadn’t meant to at first, but once I’d gotten them to believe what I was saying about me, they’d already sort of guessed what you were. I just confirmed it.”

Nezumi stood up. The chair he was sitting in scraped against the floor, and he saw Shion winced visibly.

“Shion,” he started.

“I know!” The boy turned around finally to face him. “I _know_ you didn’t want me to tell them, but it didn’t feel fair keeping them in the dark about me when they already saw it happen!”

“They didn’t need to know! Now you’ve just gone and _dragged_ them into our shitty business!”

“They were _already_ inour business, Nezumi,” Shion tried to reason. “They saw what happened to me, and it’s happened more than once since then. And, once I told them, you know what they asked about you?” He gave a laugh at that, one that meant nothing was actually funny. “They wanted to know if you were a demon, and when I asked how they knew, they said they could feel it off of you, and that they’d known since we got here that we weren’t normal.”

Nezumi felt his jaw clench. “That’s great and all, but that still doesn’t mean you should’ve told them anything about us!”

“And, what, just expect them to handle it all when things finally go to shit?”

Nezumi blinked, faltered at the words. “What’re you…?”

Shion’s face paled. “I, um…”

“You’re not telling me something.” It wasn’t a question.

“I’m not _not_ telling you anything,” Shion corrected. “You already know, I just haven’t...explained it...well…” he trailed off sheepishly, looking at the ground like he was aware he was guilty of something and felt bad about it. _Good, he should be._

“Explain,” Nezumi said.

“The scars are acting up more frequently.”

“You already told me that.”

“They’re acting in a pattern.”

Nezumi raised an eyebrow and turned around, headed to the living room. He sat down on the couch and patted the spot next to him, his earlier anger momentarily forgotten in favor of Shion’s explanation. “Okay, I still have no idea what you’re getting at.”

Shion sat down next to him, pulling his knees up to his chin, looking forlorn. “I thought at first that they were determined by my emotions, and that the less I wanted to leave here, the more they acted up. Punishment, you know, for not being resentful about my fall.”

“Right,” Nezumi nodded. “You told me that.”

“But they’re not doing that. My emotions have regulated, but the occurrences are happening more often and more severely.”

He took a deep breath, arms wrapped around his knees. His eyes were downcast. Nezumi felt himself starting to get anxious for what he was going to hear, the anger replaced by a sense of dread.

“I think,” Shion said quietly, “that the end goal is to kill me.”

The sink faucet dripped where it hadn’t been turned off all the way.

“Eventually,” he continued, his voice almost too soft to hear, “I think that they’re going to get so bad, and so frequent, that it’s just that _pain_ , nonstop, and I guess it’ll continue like that until I die from it or someone puts me out of my misery.”

“A slow and painful death,” Nezumi said quietly.

“Torture,” Shion corrected. “These scars are going to torture me until I’m killed by them. It’ll probably be days before they actually do enough damage to stop my heart, so—”

“That’s enough.” Nezumi’s voice didn’t sound like his own. “That’s enough, Shion.”

“But I’m right, aren’t I?” His words were choked, a laugh coming out like a sob, forced and pushing on hysterical. “I’m right, and you know I am, these things are going to kill me—”

“Just stop it!”

Shion stared at him, surprised at his outburst, and Nezumi forced himself to sit back down from where he’d stood up. He sank into the couch, covered his eyes with his hands, felt a tear there. “Just stop it,” he whispered.

“Nezumi…”

The ex-demon didn’t respond, couldn’t respond, felt his heart leaping in his throat and the bile rising; he ran to the bathroom and just barely made it to the toilet in time to puke.

He heard the soft footsteps of the other padding in moments later, and there were hands on his hair, holding it back for him as he puked until he was retching. Those hands carded through his hair even after he was done, soft and soothing, and he leaned his head against the cold basin.

“Nezumi…” Those hands were braiding his hair now, gentle and comforting and so, _so_ real, and when the braiding was done, they were rubbing his back, between his shoulder blades. “You know what I’m going to ask of you, don’t you?”

“I can’t.” His voice was hoarse. His mouth felt disgusting, gritty, just like everything else.

“Please, Nezumi. I need you to promise me something.”

He shook his head, once, twice, three times for good measure. “No. You can’t ask that of me, Shion, you can’t ask me to do that—”

“You’re the only one that can.”

“Stop acting so calm about it!” He snapped. “Stop acting like it’s not a big deal! You damn airhead—don’t you want to live anymore?!”

“I need you to kill me.”

“Bullshit you do!” He whipped around to yell at the other, and then immediately turned back to the bowl, puking another time, but all that came up was bile and spit. His tongue felt like lead, but once he’d stopped, somehow he still managed to say, “I’m not going to kill you.”

“You have to.”

“We’ll find another way! We’ll get rid of the scars, we’ll make them stop hurting, we’ll do _something_ —”

“There isn’t anything left to do,” Shion placated. “You think I haven’t tried looking for a loophole, a way out? This is…” He paused, like he was considering something. “...This is the only way left right now. Once it starts, I need you put me out of my misery. I don’t wanna go from some divine punishment.”

“Shion…”

“I want you to kill me.”

“I won’t do it.”

“If you don’t, the only other person I’ll be able to go to is Inukashi, and you and I both know I can’t ask that of them.”

“You can’t just ask me to kill the only person I love!” Nezumi barked. “I spent two thousand years wallowing in my own _fucking_ hatred, cursing every second I was alive—like hell I’m going to let you get taken away like that just because you got your memories back!”

Shion smiled, but his eyes were shining, wet with tears. Nezumi stared at him, confused. “What?”

“That’s the first time you’ve said you love me,” he said, and then they were both crying, bordering hysterical, and when Shion threw his arms around him, Nezumi hugged him back this time.

 

\--

 

That night, when Nezumi and Shion were lying in bed, sweaty and tired and drained, Shion tracing patterns with his thumbs on the other’s chest, Nezumi sighed and asked, “How long do we have?”

“They’re happening every week now,” Shion said quietly, still tracing. “I can’t really be sure, but it should be more than a few months.”

“A few months…” Nezumi repeated.

“Maybe more, but there’s no way to know until it happens.”

“Let’s get married.”

Shion’s thumb stopped. “ _What_?”

“Let’s get married,” Nezumi repeated. “I mean, why not? If you’re going to die anyway, and we only have a few months, let’s get married. In the meantime, I’ll work on figuring something out, and if it turns out that we can stop whatever the fuck is happening, then we’re married, and we go on living the rest of our lives, happily ever after. Not a bad idea, right?” He grinned, but it felt sadder than normal.

“Nezumi…” Shion had a hand over his mouth in disbelief and his eyes were wide.

“But then, you don’t have to say yes, obviously.” He looked away, putting his hands behind his head in faux nonchalance. “I’m just thinking out loud—”

“Of _course_ I’m going to say yes!” Shion interrupted, and it took him a moment before he realized that the ex-angel had all but thrown himself at Nezumi, and was now sitting in his lap, arms so tight around him that it was difficult to breath.

“Shion, you’re choking me,” Nezumi managed to say, and there was an _oh!_ before the arms around his neck disappeared and he was instead able to look at the other’s face, brighter and happier than he’d probably ever seen him.

“I take it that’s a yes, then,” Nezumi said, feeling himself grin. Shion didn’t respond, stopping any continuation of the conversation with an enthusiastic kiss that managed to get out of hand pretty quickly.

He pulled away some minutes later, smiling, hands cupping Nezumi’s cheeks, and said, voice heavy with happiness, “ _Yes_ , I’ll marry you.”

 

\--

 

In Nezumi’s dream, he and Shion were making love when Shion started screaming, and the scene changed so abruptly it was hard to keep up with.

Suddenly, they were in the woods the night he found him tattered and bloody, and the scars were bleeding again, cuts open and fresh like they’d never healed, burning bright like there were embers under Shion’s skin, illuminating the inside of his body and the bones underneath. Nezumi tried to stop the bleeding, but it didn’t help; Shion was screaming, screaming, screaming, begging Nezumi to kill him.

_Kill me, Nezumi,_ he said, mouth full of needles. _Kill me kill me kill me kill me_.

_I can’t do it_ , he tried to say, but what came out was a garbled mess that didn’t sound like any string of words. His skin started to burn where he was holding the man, and he dropped him without thinking about it.

Except that was a horrible mistake, because then Shion was falling, falling, _kill me, Nezumi, kill me_ —

 

\--

 

He woke up in cold sweat, but when he looked beside him, Shion was sleeping soundly, unhurt, face serene and breathing even. When he checked the clock, it was nearing midnight.

Nezumi pressed a lingering kiss to Shion’s forehead before slipping out of bed, into his shoes, and out the door.

 

\--

 

“What the _actual fuck_ do you want at twelve in the goddamn morning?”

“Nice to see you too, Inukashi,” Nezumi responded smoothly, side stepping them so he could get through the door and out of the cold.

“Explain,” they demanded, crossing their arms, but they shut the door behind him anyway. Nezumi took a seat on the tattered, dirty sofa, crossing his legs and leaning an arm over the back of it.

“Shion told you about us,” he said, more of a statement than a question.

Inukashi side-eyed him warily. “Yeah,” they said slowly, shifting where they stood like they were uncomfortable with the topic, “what about it? What, you pissed off or somethin’? Shion said you wouldn’t be too happy when—”

“I need your help.”

Inukashi stared at him for a moment. They sat down on the couch across from him, propping their feet up on the coffee table. One of their dogs jumped onto the couch next to them and curled up there. “Go on.”

By the time Nezumi had gotten finished explaining the situation and just what he needed help with, it was nearing twelve thirty, and he was starting to get anxious that Shion would wake up and find he was gone.

“So,” Inukashi said, leaning forward where they sat. “You want me to help figure out something to help Shion?”

Nezumi nodded. “Yes. I figured you didn’t want him dead any more than I do.”

“Well, that’s true and all, but what the hell do you want _me_ to do about it?” They gestured widely with their hands. “I don’t know jack shit about this whole ‘ _other-wordly’_ business besides what you guys have bothered to explain. I don’t have any more of a clue on how to help him than you do!”

“You can think of something,” Nezumi mumbled. He hadn’t really known why he’d gone to them in the middle of the night anyways, besides the fact that he’d needed to clear his head from that dream. He’d known that Inukashi wouldn’t be any help, but he hadn’t been able to stop his legs from taking him here. He rubbed his eyes tiredly.

The two of them sat in silence for a few moments, just a little bit awkward.

“I mean…” They finally said, looking away. “I can try, but don’t get pissed off if I come up with nothin’.”

“Thank you,” Nezumi said, meaning it.

Inukashi shivered. “Ugh. I hate hearing you say that. It sounds like nothin’ but bad news.”

He grinned, standing up to leave. “Then I’ll make sure never to do that again, would that appease you?”

“Just get out of my hotel, ya damn rat.”

 

\--

 

He’d just gotten back in the bedroom and was sliding under the covers when he felt Shion stir and blink his eyes open sleepily.

“Nez’mi?” he asked, voice slurred with sleep. “What’re you doing?”

“Go back to sleep,” Nezumi told him. “I’m fine, I just woke up and had to step outside for a bit.”

“Did you have a—” he yawned, cutting himself off. “Did you have a bad dream?”

“No, Shion, I’m alright. I’m going to sleep now.”

“Mmm.” The white-haired man closed his eyes and shifted so he was pressed against the other, their legs tangling. “Okay. Love you.”

“Love you too,” Nezumi said to the ceiling, already feeling the other’s steady breathing.

He didn’t find sleep again that night.

 

\--

 

They got married in the loosest of terms.

In fact, it was hardly a “marriage” at all, as there was no ceremony, nor rings, and the only thing that changed was the title. They didn’t have a party and they didn’t make it public, and if they weren’t dirt poor, Nezumi might’ve thought it wise to at least get them both rings, if nothing else.

It was Shion’s idea to go about it so loosely.

“Wouldn’t it be sort of ironic to go to a church and have someone marry us?” He’d said. “If anything, I feel like _I’m_ at least qualified for something like this.” And when they’d had their own ceremony the next morning, since neither had work until the afternoon, Shion smiled and said, “I now pronounce us husband and husband,” with that look that meant he was only half joking.

It wasn’t much of anything, but Shion seemed content with it. He couldn’t stop smiling and barely let Nezumi out of the bed at all, and even then only after some childish pouting.

Nezumi knew why Shion was acting so happy, why he was so desperate to enjoy their “ceremony,” and he could hardly blame him. He went along with it, trying the press the weight that was pulling him down to the back of his mind.

“Hey,” Shion said, as they were lying side by side on the bed, bare skin pressed together, “we’re married now.”

“That we are.” Nezumi raised an eyebrow.

“You’re my husband.” Shion sat up.

“Mhmm.”

“I’m _your_ husband.”

“That’s generally what it means when people get married, Shion,” Nezumi said, but Shion was already swinging his leg over so he was straddling Nezumi, looking very pleased with himself.

“So what now?” He asked, hands on the other’s chest.

“Mm, I don’t know, you tell me. Don’t people normally go on vacation?”

“Honeymoons,” Shion corrected.

“Yeah, that. Maybe we should do that.” He grinned.

The ex-angel laughed. “And where to? The Bahamas?”

“I’m not so sure about that one.” Nezumi grabbed Shion’s hips and flipped them over so they were turned on their side in one move, and Shion yelped in surprise before laughing.

“Warn me before you do that next time,” he chastised, but his hand found Nezumi’s.

There was a knock on their door right as he was leaning in, and both of them paused, waited a moment, before hearing the banging again, and a voice that sounded an awful lot like Inukashi demanding that they _let me in already, I’m freezing my ass off out here!_

Nezumi, sighed, rolled his eyes, and forced himself out of the warm bed, slipping on some shorts before making his way out of their room and into the living room, where the main entrance was. He swung open the door irritably.

“What do you want?” he demanded, not bothering for a hello, and not too pleased at having been interrupted.

“I’ve been out here in the cold _waiting_ for someone to open this damn door forever now!” They huffed, arms around themself as they shivered. “And put some fucking clothes on!”

“Sorry, I happened to be in the _middle_ of something when you tried to break in,” he snapped sarcastically, just as Shion made his way out of the bedroom to greet their guest, having wrapped himself in a blanket for more warmth.

“Oh! Inukashi!” His face lit up in a polite smile. “What are you doing here?”

Inukashi looked between the two of them before they seemed to realize what exactly Nezumi had meant by _the middle of something_ ; at the realization, their face heated up and they looked away from Shion embarrassedly. Nezumi rolled his eyes but closed the door behind them.

“N-nothing,” they mumbled. “I need to talk to Nezumi about...something.”

“If it’s about Shion, he should be around to hear this anyway,” Nezumi said, leaning against the doorframe and crossing his ankles.

“What about me?” Shion said, making his way to the kitchenette with his blanket dragging behind him like a cape. He turned on the stove and put a pot on. “Oh, and Inukashi, I can make you some tea if you want. You must still be really cold.”

“I’m fine,” they snapped, but they were still shivering, and they sat down at the kitchen table anyway. “And...yes, it’s about Shion.”

“I told them about the situation,” Nezumi explained to the aforementioned boy.

Shion blinked. “When did you have time to talk to them?”

“Came to me in the middle of the goddamn night,” they provided helpfully with a snort. “He pretty much _begged_ me for my help.”

“I did nothing of the sort.”

“Did too!”

“So that’s where you went last night?” Shion intervened, filling the pot with water and setting it back on the burner. “And I take it that means you explained everything to them.”

Nezumi nodded before taking a seat at the table as well. “Yep. So, what’d you come here for anyway?” he said, directed at the guest. He could feel that they’d been staring at the scars on his back, both the burns and from being forced to Earth, but he pretended not to notice.

“I don’t know all that much about...well, you guys,” they admitted, scratching their cheek, “but I sort of figured, if things like you two, ya know, angels and demons and shit, are real, why wouldn’t magic stuff be real too? And then I was thinkin’...that there could be some sort of...magic that could help get rid of Shion’s scars, right?”

“Magic isn’t real,” Nezumi shot down immediately, but the other boy was surprisingly quiet, saying nothing and doing nothing but staring at the teapot as the water boiled. They all sat in silence as they waited for Shion to respond.

After pouring them all a cup of tea separately and sitting down at the table, he stared at the contents of his mug and said, “Magic is real.”

Nezumi gave him a look. “Shion—”

“Not the kind that normal people can do,” he hurried to amend. “Humans can’t do magic, and the term _magic_ probably isn’t even the best one to use in describing it. But angels—and demons—have powers, you know that, don’t you, Nezumi?” He took a sip of his drink. “You had some, and I did too, before…”

“That may be true, but humans can’t do magic, and we’re human now. And I’m not exactly seeing any angelic beings coming down to help us right now.”

“Do you know how long it takes for an angel to become human?”

Both Inukashi and Nezumi stared at him.

“You said it took a few months, a year at most,” Nezumi answered. He hadn’t touched his drink.

Shion nodded. “Right. Generally, I thought that if an angel fell, then it shouldn’t take much longer than a few months to become human. But the only reference I really had was myself and my own experiences, because they never talked about any of the Fallen Ones in Heaven, because it was—well, to put it lightly, it was taboo. We didn’t talk about it, so we didn’t learn about it either.

“But when I got here and I found you, you were saying that in a year, you would be human, and that that’s what happened when demons ended up on Earth for extended periods of time, so it only made sense that I would follow the same rule, wouldn’t it? Considering just how close the two species are in lots of other aspects.”

Inukashi set their drink down and shook their head. “This is still so damn weird to hear about.”

Shion smiled at them. “Ah, right, you’re still new to this. I’m sorry.”

They shrugged and leaned back in their chair. “Sorta knew you guys were gonna have some weird shit goin’ on with you. Keep talkin’.”

He nodded and traced a ring on the top of his mug. “So I assumed that the same thing would happen to me, but it’s not much of a secret that angels and demons are pretty different, so there really wasn’t any way to know for sure how long the process would be—or if that process would even happen at all. I realized the other day that, in Heaven, no one actually ever _said_ that falling makes you human—only that you get stuck on Earth, and that it was the ultimate punishment for the worst crime you could commit.”

“Which was apparently just having emotions,” Nezumi mumbled into his drink.

Shion ignored the comment. “And I realized that there’s not actually any way to know if I’ve really been turned into a human or not.”

Both Nezumi and Inukashi stopped what they were doing and stared at them.

“ _Wait_.” Nezumi set his cup down. “You’re saying that you could still be an angel?”

“Theoretically.”

“What do you mean, ‘ _theoretically_ ’? Are you or aren’tchya?” Inukashi demanded.

“I don’t know.” Before either of them could say anything else, he continued, “But if I am, that means that I could still have some abilities from when I was in Heaven. I have emotions now, and I’m down to a normal number of limbs—”

“Holy fuckin’ shit,” Inukashi mumbled.

“—But I had emotions when I was in Heaven too, and you could very well make the case that I only have four limbs now because otherwise I couldn’t fit in on Earth, same with why I don’t have wings anymore either. Alternatively, I could be stuck in essentially some sort of limbo between human and angel—without angel appearances but with human memories and emotions, and then, making it so I couldn’t truly fit in either place, I could’ve been stuck with angelic powers.” He smiled, a little sardonically. “More punishment, to be stuck between both forms without ever being able to choose one. That would explain why the scars can hurt me in the first place, since human scars wouldn’t do that.”

“But so then, you can stop them from hurting, can’t you?” Inukashi set their chair down from where they’d been leaning back and instead put their elbows on the table.

“Again, this is all just theory,” Shion said, scratching the back of his head, “but I think...that’s technically possible.”

“Technically?” Nezumi glanced up from his mug.

Shion nodded. “Yeah. Whatever ‘powers’ I have left are...really faint. Like, really, _really_ faint, to the point where I can pretty much only feel that they’re there when…” he stopped what he was saying abruptly, and looked away, his face redder than normal. “W-well, that’s not that important. But the point is, if I wanted to use whatever’s left to get the scars to stop, I would need something that could amplify what’s left. You know, make it more easily accessible.”

“Like what?” Inukashi asked, eyebrows furrowed.

“Like…” Shion thought about it for a moment. “A church, maybe?”

“A church?”

“Yeah.” He nodded. “Being in a church might help to ‘channel’ it better, so to speak.”

Nezumi looked away. “How come you never mentioned any of this to me?”

“I’ve been...mulling it over for a long time,” he answered, voice gentle like he was choosing his words carefully, “but it was all just sort of a feeling, and not anything concrete, so I didn’t want to mention it and get anyone’s hopes up, especially to you, but…it’s looking like this is the only option left. And to tell you the truth,” he smiled at Nezumi, “I only really figured out last night that there were any sort of powers left over at all.”

“What happened last night?” Inukashi asked, and then immediately said, a little louder than necessary,  “Wait, never mind—don’t answer that. Please.”

Nezumi smiled, but it felt a little less hostile than normal. “What, you don’t want to hear about my husband and I’s private affairs?”

They wrinkled their nose at the words. “‘Husband’?”

“I married us,” Shion provided helpfully.

“You’re not a priest,” they said, deadpan and with an eyebrow raised.

Shion smiled brightly. “No. But I’m an angel, and I’d say that’s sufficient enough.”

 

\--

 

It felt odd to continue going to work after everything that had happened, but most of their days were spent in a weird sense of calm, where they both knew there was nothing they could do but try to figure out their game plan and wait, so they couldn’t afford to not go to work, at least if they still wanted to eat.

Shion still came to his show two weeks after they were “married,” walking all that way out in the cold, and when it was over, he visited Nezumi backstage with Inukashi, whom he’d forced to come along once more.

“You were great!” he said, all smiles—most of which felt just a little more forced those days.

Nezumi felt himself grin in response. “I would’ve done better had I known you were going to be here tonight.”

Inukashi huffed and blew a strand of hair out of their face.

“I agreed to go with you to see it, but not to stand behind while you two got all gross and couple-y,” they complained. “I’m goin’ home.”

“Aww, don’t whine,” Shion chastised. “And besides, it’s snowing, and your hotel is a while away. I’ll walk with you.”

“You don’t have to do that!”

“What’s this? Inukashi, are you blushing?” Nezumi teased.

“Sh-shut the hell up! I’m leaving!”

Shion gave him an apologetic look, before pecking him on the cheek and saying, “I’ll see you at home.”

Nezumi watched them leave in the snow and felt a tug at his chest.

If they didn’t figure out what they were going to do, this would be Shion’s last winter.

 

\--

 

“Your one year anniversary is coming up.”

Shion blinked, looking up from the book he was reading. “One year anniversary for what?”

“For when you fell, of course.” Nezumi propped his feet up on the coffee table, shuffling a deck of cards in his hands absentmindedly. “But I guess that’s not a very pleasant memory, so if you’d like, you could think of it more as the one year anniversary of us living together.”

At the words, Shion smiled. “Yeah, I think I like the latter much better. Things are a lot different now than they were when I first got here, huh?” He mused. “The year felt...really long, surprisingly.”

“A lot more happens in a year on Earth than it would in a year on Heaven,” Nezumi said. “‘S probably why it felt so long.”

“Do you think we could’ve had this had we not gotten stuck here?”

Nezumi stopped shuffling and looked at the other for a moment. “Hm? Had what?”

“Us. I mean—not living together, probably, because there wouldn’t have been a need for that, but us being together, romantically, I mean. Do you think that could’ve happened had we not been here?”

“Nope.”

Shion pouted at the immediate answer. “You’re not even going to give yourself time to think about it?”

“Don’t need to. I already know the answer, and it is: no. There’s absolutely no way we could’ve been together had we stayed the way we were.”

“What makes you so sure?”

Nezumi set the cards down and leaned forward across the table; he saw Shion’s surprise at the movement, but Shion didn’t move away.

“Because angels and demons couldn’t and still can’t be together, even in the most innocent meaning of the phrase. No one would’ve _allowed_ us to be like this, and if we’d tried, we’d get stuck here in the end anyway.”

Shion didn’t respond, instead frowning and seeming to think about the words for a few minutes. Nezumi had just started to open his mouth to ask about dinner when Shion finally said, “So, Earth is the birthplace of us. Because even if we’d been together before this, we would’ve been sent to Earth in the end anyway.”

“If you want to think of it like that, yes.”

“Earth…” He stared at the page of his book, but he wasn’t reading. Nezumi watched him for a moment; watched the way his fingers curled around the sides of the cover; watched the way his lips formed a small, fond smile; watched the way his violet eyes softened almost unnoticeably.

“It’s my turn to make dinner tonight,” Nezumi said. Shion’s lips twitched. Nezumi ignored the urge to kiss him.

“Alright,” he finally answered, glancing up from where he’d been staring at the page, and offered a small smile. “I went to the store this morning, so we should have everything.”

Dinner that night was oddly silent, as Shion still seemed lost in thought and Nezumi had little to say, but about halfway through, Shion asked, “How long have you been on Earth?”

Nezumi thought about the question. “Almost two years now, I guess.” He took a sip of his drink. “What makes you ask that all of the sudden?”

“I’ve only been here for a year, so I don’t know as much about how the world works as you do…”

“You get by pretty okay,” Nezumi said, only half teasing.

“I really love Earth.”

Nezumi didn’t say anything, waiting for him to finish.

“I know that...I know that I was acting like I’d given up on living, and that it seemed like I didn’t want to…to be alive...” He frowned at his food. “But I really do want to live. I want to keep living, like this, with you, on Earth. I know I said a long time ago that I’d have been okay with still being an angel as long as I was with you, but I really don’t think I would have…”

“What brings on all this so suddenly?” Nezumi asked gently.

Shion shrugged. “Nothing, really. I’ve just been thinking about it, and it felt like I needed to tell you.”

They finished dinner in silence.

Once he was done, he smiled reassuringly and got up from his seat, taking his plate to the sink. “I’ll do the dishes tonight.”

Nezumi stood up and stretched, nodding at the statement. “In that case, I’m heading off to bed.” He made his way to the bedroom, but stopped at the doorway, hand stilling on the frame, just out of sight of the kitchen.

“You love Earth, huh…”

 

\--

 

The illusion of peace that had lasted in the winter thawed along with everything else as spring came, and by the time flowers were blooming, the sense of calm was anything but present.

 

\--

 

Near the city limits in the mountains, there was a church sitting on a hill, abandoned and empty, with a small, decaying graveyard in the back with dates on the stones preceding the 1850’s. Inukashi had lived in that town all their life, and they swore up and down that they’d never seen even so much as a single car in that church’s parking lot, and it had been boarded up for most of their life up until recently.

Which, as it turned out, was most of the reason Shion chose it; the other reason being that he felt more comfortable with it being so far away from the main part of the town, and conveniently not near any houses. _I don’t want us to get interrupted_ , he’d explained.

Nezumi didn’t really care about where it was they chose, and he was perfectly fine with whatever it was suited Shion most, but he had to admit the church was ghostly, with moss growing on the walls and pews with rotting wood. The podium at the altar was all but destroyed, a bible with damp pages lying on the floor in front of it, untouched, covered in dust and missing a few pages.

Approximately a day before it would start (according to what Shion had estimated), they took a bus up the mountain and then walked the rest of the way, but they had to stop in the middle of the trek because of Shion’s scars. Nezumi ended up carrying him the rest of the walk, and by the time they got to the church, it had calmed down and Shion could think properly again. Inukashi looked apprehensive. Shion looked like he was stepping up to his execution. Nezumi mostly just wanted things to be over with.

They entered the church, stepped over dead animals that had crawled their way in just to suffocate, pushed back cobwebs that hung from the stained glass windows, and got ten feet in before Shion immediately collapsed on the floor. Both Inukashi and Nezumi rushed to help him up.

“This place smells horrible,” Inukashi grumbled, wrinkling their nose even as the two of them lifted Shion onto one of the pews that hadn’t collapsed already. They were masking their worry for Shion in childlike complaints, or at least trying to; it didn’t work so much when they were biting their lip and looking off with eyebrows furrowed the moment they had finished talking.

Shion was so used to the pain of it by then that he didn’t scream anymore, barely whimpered at that point either; most of his reactions came from the way he lost control of his movement, as his legs seized up and left him to fall. Inukashi and Nezumi had been getting desensitized from the process, but because of the events ahead, their worry had returned fresh in their mind.

“I’m fine now,” Shion croaked, standing up on shaking legs, but he fell forward again and Inukashi had to help him stand up. They stumbled to the front of the church, right at the decaying alter, and Shion sat on the floor in front of it.

“You get to do the laundry once this is all over,” Nezumi commented, looking at the way dust and dirt collected on Shion where he sat, but the comment was a hollow attempt to act like there was a certain _once this is all over_ , a way to soothe their minds about the outcome a little.

The truth was that it was very likely Shion would die there.

“How do we…?” Inukashi asked, fidgeting nervously where they stood, wiping their sweaty palms on the front of their jeans.

“I’m not really sure what will happen,” Shion answered, sitting with his legs criss-crossed, arms slack in his lap, “so we just need to be careful. Make sure I’m not interrupted while this happens, but besides that we should be fine.”

“Awesome,” they mumbled, looking around. “So we can’t do anything else.”

“Stop complaining. Let’s leave him to it.” Nezumi turned around and started to walk out of the church, hands in his pockets. He felt Inukashi start to follow him before they stopped.

“Shion…”

“I’ll be fine.” Even without seeing it, Nezumi was sure the airhead was smiling, reassuring something that he had no real knowledge about. Making a promise he couldn’t keep. “Don’t worry about me.”

There was silence for a moment. Inukashi took a deep, ragged breath, like they were trying to hold back tears.

“Just don’t die, stupid.”

“I’ll see you guys in a little bit.”

Nezumi bit his lip and felt Inukashi start to follow him. They got to the double doors, rusted and breaking, before he stopped, barely feeling Inukashi looking at him over the heavy drumming of his heartbeat in his ears.

“Shion.”

He didn’t look, but he heard the quite _hmm?_ in response and could almost pretend they were in their kitchen, the night after a show, with his back to Shion as he sat on the couch and watched him do the dishes.

“It’s your turn to cook tonight,” he said, and refused to turn around even as they closed the doors behind them.

 

\--

 


	2. the rebirth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“Halfway along our journey to life’s end_
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> _I found myself astray in a dark wood…”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> MMMM YES HELLO THIS TOOK A LONG TIME
> 
> few things:
> 
> **1.** theres a scene where nezumi and shion play a card game. theyre playing bullshit in case you didnt know what that game was
> 
> **2.** this was so much fun to write holy shi t??? ahhhh
> 
> **3.** the ending is? sort of angsty....i apologize. but i also am like it so theres that
> 
> **4.** LOTS OF INUKASHI IN THIS PART HELLo. i love inukashi. i rlly rlly like writing them they r so important to me and i just love developing their relationships w/ nez and shion
> 
> **5.** this fic was a pain in the ass to write but i am . actlyly rlly proud of it?? also its 101 pages, aprox. 50k words. again: am proud
> 
> anyway, enjoy the end of our double-chap-ed fic

**The Rebirth**

 

 

The Rebirth began only minutes after they’d stepped out of the church, a winding hill slopping down in front of them, when the world seemed to shift under them and suddenly they weren’t on that hill anymore.

Nezumi saw woods stretching out in front of him, and his view shifted like he was playing a first person shooter gamer. There was the sound of a little boy yelling over the noise of rain, wind whipping around what he would later figure out was Shion’s body, little hands gripped into fists as he screamed. For what reason, Nezumi couldn’t figure out, but the body he was in screamed for a long minute, voice swallowed with the wind, eyes closed shut from exertion.

Then the body he was in was being slammed into the wall behind him, and what greeted him was a pair of silver eyes and a hand at his throat.

“Don’t move,” a small, young voice growled in a language Nezumi had forgotten he spoke, and Nezumi had the sudden realization _that’s me,_ before it clicked. He was in Shion’s memories, and this was the day they met, two thousand years ago.

The body Nezumi was in—Shion’s body, little Shion—brought his hands up to the pair around his throat, instinctively trying to pry them away, before his line of sight fell on the wound on little Nezumi’s arm, dripping blood onto the ground in front of them.

“I can treat that,” Shion said, in that same language, and little Nezumi’s eyes narrowed—present Nezumi had the realization that he could tell Shion’s thoughts as well, as he felt the thought _such quiet eyes_ —but his grip around Shion’s throat only tightening at the words.

Shion licked his lips. “You’re hurt. I can treat your wound.”

The rain was still pounding down. Nezumi’s eyes softened, seeming to consider the offer, and there was a good moment of neither daring to move before he slowly let his arm fall.

Little Shion led him into his house, small and ancient, but they had to be quiet because his mother was sleeping and they couldn’t wake her up. He stitched up the wound with a needle and thread, and the two talked in hushed tones.

“You have an accent,” Shion commented. “Where are you from?”

“That doesn’t matter,” Nezumi snapped.

Little Nezumi didn’t say anything for a minute after that, only pressing his lips together and narrowing his eyes before he looked away. Shion smiled, all wide teeth and childish good nature, and there was the thought _he’s interesting. I like him._

“What’s your name?” It was Nezumi that asked this time.

“Shion, like the flower.”

“You’re weird, you know that?”

Shion only blinked, tilting his head. “What do you mean?”

“The only thing you’ve asked me this whole time was where I’m from. A stranger comes to you and tries to kill you, and you treat them while you haven’t even asked what my name is—or why I’m hurt.”

“Well, what _is_ your name then?”

There was a pause. “…Nezumi.”

_That can’t be it_. “Really?”

“Yes.”

“That can’t be your _real_ name.”

“It is.”

“But you don’t seem…” _you don’t seem like a rat._

The world shifted again, and Nezumi in the present recognized it as the memory changing.

 

\--

 

This memory was hazy, but Nezumi couldn’t tell if that was because it was slowly being forgotten or if it was because at the time his vision had been fading. It felt like he was lying on the ground, hard dirt maybe, and there was the sounds of crying above him.

A woman’s face came into view, a woman with short brown hair and tear streaks running down her face. Nezumi thought she was probably much more beautiful when she wasn’t sobbing.

“M-mother…” Shion’s voice said, weak, fading, and the woman—his mother—tried for a smile. There was pressure on his hand; she was holding it.

“Shion,” she said, voice so sad but trying to force sounding happy, “Shion, you’ll be alright, won’t you? My flower, you’re going to be okay. Stay with me. Keep your eyes open. ”

His vision was fading in and out.

“I-I’m sorry...”

“Don’t apologize, you have nothing to apologize for—stay with me, Shion, don’t close your eyes.”

He was so tired. _I want to go to sleep_.

“Honey,” her voice was edging on hysterical; her grip hardened. “Keep your eyes open, Shion, I love you, please don’t—“

“I’m sorry, Mother.”

“ _Shion_!”

His eyes closed.

 

\--

 

When they opened this time, it was blinding white, and there was a searing pain all over, _all over_ , like he was being burned alive—

Then there was nothing; there was no more pain, and he couldn’t remember what he was so upset about a moment before. It felt like he was resting on air. What was his name?

_Shion. My name is Shion._

The white subsided, and he realized he was lying on the ground, with a face above his, androgynous with wide brown eyes that seemed to be scrutinizing him.

“Hello,” the face said in a feminine voice, and he watched the way the person’s lips formed the words before they registered in his head and he blinked.

“Hello,” he said in response. “Who are you?”

“Safu,” the girl answered. “Who are _you_?”

“Um.” He sat up, looked around. Wherever he was, it seemed like the place couldn’t decide whether it was day or night; there was light, sunlight probably, where he sat with the girl, but when he looked around him, the sky seemed to split between stages of the day, and a few meters away from the two, it was pitch black. “My name’s Shion, I think. Where am I?”

Safu smiled. “Hello, Shion. You’re new, but you look like you were my age when you died—“

“ _Died_?”

“You were reborn,” she explained.

“Am I…in Heaven then?”

She nodded, brown hair bobbing, and he realized that her eyes, dark brown, didn’t have pupils. It was slightly unsettling, but for some reason it didn’t feel entirely out of place.

“Oh!” She exclaimed, reaching forward suddenly and grabbing two of his hands—it seemed he had two pairs of arms, one coming from his shoulders and the other directly below it. “You’re so lucky,” she fawned, inspecting his palm, “most of us don’t get this many.”

“This many…hands?”

“Extra limbs are a rarity,” she said, letting his hand drop. “Oh, but I shouldn’t have touched you without asking for your consent—I apologize for my rudeness.”

“No, that’s alright.” Shion stood up on shaky legs before steadying himself and flexing his arms, trying to get used to the feeling of the new limbs, and he felt _something_ fanning out behind him.

“Oh, and you have such beautiful wings too!” she said, before unfurling her own to show them to him. They spanned out for quite a while, around thirty feet he estimated, large and colored with maroon feathers. She flapped them once slowly. “Mine are pretty beautiful too, of course, but they’re nothing too special. Yours are breathtaking, though.”

He stretched his own, unused to the muscles that allowed him to do that, felt a weight behind him and when he craned his neck, he was met with white feathers, speckled with purple that seemed to flicker in the light when he moved his wings. “Th-thank you, I guess, but I can’t say I have much to compare to. Does this mean…” _does this mean I’m an angel? Are you an angel too?_

“We’re angels, yes,” she answered, already seeming to know what he was going to ask, and later he would find out it was because she had. She smiled then, friendly and polite. “Would you like me to show you around?”

“O-oh, yes, of course. Thank you.”

 

\--

 

Safu and Shion were in what was the other-worldly equivalent of a bar, selling ambrosia and wine, although angels couldn’t get drunk. Because of this, the atmosphere wasn’t at all like a bar you would see on Earth—as well as the fact that it was the B.C.s and such things as _bars_ didn’t exist yet at all; that wouldn’t be for a long time for the humans, a few angels had said, the ones that could tell the future at least.

Angelic powers manifested in a multitude of ways; some of which included mind reading (as Safu had) and telling the future. Shion didn’t think he had any powers, because the only thing that seemed _off_ about him was that he seemed to _understand_ the humans better than most other angels did; whether this was because he was messed up, he didn’t know, but he’d not heard of anything like empathy being a power, so he told no one but Safu, and even that was mostly because she could read his mind anyway, meaning secrets weren’t really anything the two friends had.

At the time, they were sitting at the bar, which Shion had suggested they go to for lack of anything better to do that day—although the concept of time in Heaven was loose, and therefore a “day” varied quite often—but it had taken some time to convince Safu to go along with it, as that particular area seemed to attract demons more than angels.

“I thought you weren’t worried about things like that,” he teased, and she frowned.

“I’m not _worried_ about anything, I just feel it wouldn’t be wise to go to a place like… _that_ when we’re aware of the sort of creatures that often visit.”

Shion ignored her comment; he didn’t entirely understand the act of separating the two species, nor did he quite understand the hatred each side seemed to hold for the other (although, for angels, _hatred_ was another loose concept that varied quite often), but he said nothing of it himself, for fear of anything else that would make him out of the ordinary. “Saying you’re worried with different phrasing is still saying you’re worried.”

She huffed and crossed her arms. “Oh, whatever, Shion. Let’s just leave already.”

“No, no,” he grabbed her elbow as she tried to slide out of her seat, urging her to sit down, “please stay. I just want to stay a little longer, and then we can go.”

She gave him a look. “Promise?”

He nodded, smiling reassuringly. “I promise.”

“Fine.” Safu got back into her seat, putting her elbows on the table. He saw her wings twitch where they were folded up against her back when someone brushed past her. “I can’t believe the things I do for you.”

He laughed. “And I appreciate you for them.”

“You better.”

The sound of a glass breaking behind them interrupted their conversation. They turned around to two demons, one pressed up against the wall with another demon pressing a broken glass shard into his throat. A drop of black blood pooled at his neck, and he smirked, seeming amused despite being in such a situation.

Shion stood up, ignoring the hand Safu put on his shoulder and the quiet _Shion, you shouldn’t do anything_ she mumbled, trying and failing to placate him. He pushed his way through the crowd that had gathered to the two, stupidly brave. “What do you think you’re doing?”

Both of the demons turned to him, giving him a look. The one holding the shard raised an eyebrow and sneered, face contorted. “What’d you think _you’re_ doing, angel?” He spat the word out like an insult.

Shion blinked. “I really don’t think it’s wise to—“

“Stay out of our business,” he interrupted, grip tightening where he was holding the other up by the front of his shirt.

“He’s right,” the second one said, a line of black dripping down his lips. Shion stared at its descent until it disappeared down his chin. “You shouldn’t be getting mixed up in _dirty_ things like this—”

His head was slammed into the wall behind him.

“Don’t talk to that _katharo_ when I’m still not through with you!”

“You’re spitting on me,” the other mumbled, looking entirely too bored.

“I don’t think you realize the situation you’re in.” The glass shard dug deeper into his throat. “Maybe I should make it more clear.”

He fell to the floor a second later, hitting his head on the corner of a chair after Shion swiped his feet out from under him.

“Did you forget about the _katharo_ standing behind you?” he asked mockingly while picking up the shard from the floor, although he couldn’t tell what came over him for him to act so out of character. He opened his mouth to say something else, but suddenly he was being slammed in the wall as well, this time by the other demon, who pinned all four of his arms back with surprising ease, making the glass clatter to the floor underneath him.

“Don’t move,” the demon said, claws sharp at his throat with silver eyes on his, and Shion was hit with a brief wave of nostalgia before he blinked and it was gone.

“How’d you disarm me so quickly?” he asked, eyes wide now with curiosity. He hadn’t even had enough time to react before he was against the wall. He voiced these thoughts, and the demon in front of him laughed, dark hair falling in his face as he leaned forward.

“You’re pretty unusual, aren’t you?” he asked. Shion realized belatedly that the crowd around him had begun to lose interest in their exchange.

“My name’s Shion,” he blurted out, before the other demon, the one who’d started the encounter, began to get up from the ground, and he noticed Safu a few feet away, looking furious and just a little bit worried.

“Well, Shion, it seems you and I both have to go,” the demon said, releasing his grip and taking a step to the side, evading just as the other guy lunged for him. Shion didn’t have time to respond before Safu pulled his arm and all but yanked them out of the bar.

“What were you _thinking?_ ” she demanded, but she knew exactly what he was thinking, and he couldn’t quite focus on her chewing him out when those silver eyes sill burned into his mind.

 

\--

 

“His name is Nezumi.”

Safu raised an eyebrow at him from where she sat, a book in hand. “Who?”

“That demon. From the bar.”

She sighed and rolled her eyes a little. “You’re _still_ caught up on that?”

“Of course I am.” He sat down at the table with her, closing her book for her so she could focus on him instead. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Because he’s a _demon_ and it’s…not _usual_ to develop such an interest in someone like him.” Safu always made sure to avoid using the word _weird_ when talking about Shion, but he knew what she meant anyway.

“What does _katharo_ mean?”

Safu sighed and bit her thumb, looking away. “I forgot that you’re still pretty new here…” She paused and looked around to make sure no one else was going to overhear them, before lowering her voice to a whisper. “ _Katharotita_ _is_ a word that refers to angels, and it’s shortened to _katharo_. It technically—it technically means ‘purity’ but demons use it to mean…”

There was a pause. Shion filled in the gap. “So then, it’s a slur?”

“Yes, Shion, it’s a slur. So you shouldn’t say it in public, and you definitely shouldn’t say it to anyone else.”

He nodded. “Okay.”

“And anyway, how’d you find out the demon’s name? It’s rude to snoop in people’s personal business, you know.”

“I know, I know,” he waved her off. “I just asked around. He’s pretty popular, it seems.”

“You…’asked around’?” She raised her eyebrow at him.

“It wasn’t difficult!” he defended.

“Shion, I really think your borderline _obsession_ with this Nezumi character is unhealthy for you—“

“I’m not _obsessed_. I just…” he sighed. “I just feel like I know him from somewhere. I’m trying to remember where I met him before.”

Safu was quiet for a moment. “You’re trying to remember, huh…”

They sat in silence for a moment, but any moment where Safu wasn’t speaking was an odd one; she talked a lot, at least to Shion, so for her to be quiet usually meant she was thinking about something heavy.

“Is there something wrong?” he asked, fidgeting in his seat.

“Shion…” She was still biting her thumb. “I really don’t think…well…Where do you think you’re remembering him from? You’ve not been here very long, so I don’t really see how you could have seen him within that time…”

It wasn’t necessary for him to say the answer out loud. Once she’d read his mind, her eyes widened, and she sat forward in her chair. “ _Shion_!”

“What?” He knew what.

“It—it shouldn’t be _possible_ for you to have known him from when you were a human—“ She stopped abruptly and looked around them before lowering her voice once again. “I mean, of course, it’s possible that when you were a human, you two— _interacted_ at some point, but you shouldn’t be able to remember that at all.”

“I don’t know for sure that I even knew him from then,” Shion said, putting his hands up like he was surrendering. “It’s not a big deal, okay, Safu? For all I know I just happened to pass him one time when I first got here, and just forgot about seeing him until now. It’s nothing.”

“Shion…”

He stood up. “I’ll talk to you later, alright?”

 

\--

 

The third time he saw Nezumi was twenty years later. Safu wasn’t with him, as she’d been busy with some official business like she normally was, but he was walking around a secluded area near the bar where they’d first met when a figure snuck up behind him.

Of course, his first reaction was to defend himself, but he relaxed once he’d realized who it was. “Oh, Nezumi, it’s you!”

“Nice to see you too,” the demon said, hand on his nose. _Oh. I hit him with my wing on accident, didn’t I?_

“Oh, I’m so sorry!” Shion reached out to help him before he realized there wasn’t exactly much to do. Black blood dripped out Nezumi’s nose where he’d been whacked after startling the other, so unlike the gold that angels bled.

“’S not a big deal,” he said, voice a little nasally as he titled his head back to stop the flow.

“Demons bleed black,” Shion mumbled, staring at the liquid that dripped down his chin before the bleeding stopped completely and his broken nose was healed.

“That they do.” He wiggled his nose, presumably to get the feeling back. “Still not used to healing that quick.”

“How long have you been…?”

“What, a demon?”

Shion nodded. “Yeah. A demon.”

Nezumi shrugged. “Two hundred years, maybe? Not that long. I don’t really keep count, since it seems like _such_ a hassle. Why? Are you new?”

“Sort of. I’ve been here for, I guess, around two hundred, now, same as you.”

Nezumi gave him an amused look. “Well, since you seem a little slow on the pick up of things, let me go ahead and tip you off; generally, demons and angels,“ he gestured to the two of them respectively, “don’t _‘mix_.’”

“I know.”

“So then you’re aware that what’s happening right now—you know, us, talking, _civilly—_ is considered out of the ordinary and therefore not appropriate?”

“I know.”

He grinned, showing off shark teeth. “And you know that staring at me so much like that is going to give people the wrong idea, right?”

Shion blinked, not realizing at all that he’d been staring. “I’m sorry, I didn’t realize that was upsetting you. I can stop.”

“And you _also_ know that doing things like asking demons about their _comfort_ regarding you doing something or, in general, taking their feelings into account is also considered inappropriate.”

“Well, that one doesn’t…” He frowned, looking away, one pair of arms crossed over his chest with the other behind his back, twiddling his thumbs.

“You’re a weird one, you know that?”

It should’ve been insulting to be called weird by him; it should’ve upset him or hurt his feelings a little at least, but instead it just felt sort of…liberating. Having someone else who agreed that he was weird was liberating.

“You’re not entirely normal yourself, are you?” Shion said. “You don’t act like all the other demons.”

Nezumi’s tail twitched at the words, and his expression steeled. “How exactly am I supposed to act, then, Your Majesty?”

“You seem to be under the impression that I’m the only one going about this conversation oddly,” Shion said, “but you’re indulging me, and not only that, you seem willing in doing so. You _want_ to talk to me. Now why is that?”

“I may not have been a demon for too long a time,” Nezumi said, “but the whole _situation_ gets boring pretty quickly. You’re entertaining. That’s all.”

“I entertain you.”

Nezumi gave him a look but didn’t respond.

“Aren’t you supposed to be, like—‘constantly filled with rage’ and all of that? Shouldn’t being around me just make you angry instead of entertaining you?”

“I’m a man of many tastes,” he said. “I’m allowed to have more than one emotion regarding a person.”

“So talking to a _katharo_ doesn’t do anything but entertain you.”

Nezumi was silent for a moment, seeming stunned at the word choice, before he grimaced and looked away. “Well, it _did_ entertain me, but I might just change my opinion now that you’re starting to piss me off.”

Shion smiled brightly.

 

\--

 

Falling wasn’t a sudden process. He slowly began getting his memories back, and with them came mood swings that definitely weren’t considered normal for an angel. Safu started worrying about him, probably because she knew that once he got his memories back completely, he would fall. They were friends, after all, and she didn’t want him to be put through that. He figured she would miss him. He knew he would miss her if that happened.

By the time the new millennia rolled around, he remembered almost everything, and he thought a lot about his seemingly brief time on Earth; he knew that he had known Nezumi, but he couldn’t remember what exactly happened between the two, just that they knew each other. The odd desire to be around the demon, learn more about him, _become close to him_ —had only increased as time went by.

He wasn’t given time to say goodbye to Safu, nor was he given a warning. One day, Shion just woke up to a blinding white light and pain all over his body like being burned alive, reminiscent of when he’d been reborn, dragging on for what felt like hours as he screamed his throat hoarse. The next thing he knew he was waking up on Nezumi’s bed.

It took him a while before he really processed what had happened, but there was no doubt about it: he’d fallen.

 

\--

 

Nezumi was an— _interesting_ housemate. This was a fact Shion had been pretty quick on finding out, as it didn’t take long to get warmed up to each other. The underlying history between the two, the memories from their rebirth, made it easier to get used to living with essentially a total stranger.

His habits were odd. He only liked his soup made a certain way, and he talked about Shakespeare a lot. The alcove was filled to the brim with books like he couldn’t ever get enough of them, and furniture was scare, both due to money and the lack of space, as the shelves took up a large portion of it. He sang in the shower, recited lines from _Macbeth_ and _Hamlet_ and made the arrangement for the two of them to switch off between sleeping on the couch and sleeping on the bed (it was later that they would come to sleep together in the same bed anyway).

It was about a week of the two of them living together before Shion woke up to Nezumi talking in his sleep. That was another one of his odd habits, albeit probably one he was unaware of.

Shion couldn’t quite tell what language he was speaking, but whatever it was, it was nothing Shion had ever heard. It sounded slurred, although that was probably more from the sleep than anything, Most of what he said was mumbled into his pillow on his side of the bed, and Shion figured it was the polite thing to do to just ignore it; he didn’t seem to be bothered by anything, and he wasn’t thrashing in his sleep or screaming. But when he looked over, Nezumi’s face was scrunched up like he was in pain, eyebrows furrowed, his fists clenched around the bed sheet.

Shion didn’t wake him up, but if he happened to forgo his blanket that night for the other to have, no one had to know.

 

\--

 

“What’s up with your hair anyway?”

Shion looked up from where he was scrubbing down one of the older dogs, a German Shepard that had been in need of a bath for a while now. Sitting on the ledge of the nearby fountain was his employer, Inukashi, who could only be described as small, androgynous, and, in the nicest of terms, vulgar. Regardless, Shion was grateful to them for giving him a job, and for taking such good care of him.

In the time that he’d been on Earth, he’d met quite a few humans, two of which included Inukashi and Rikiga. Rikiga was a middle-aged reporter who was one step away from being an alcoholic, and he often got in arguments with both Nezumi and Inukashi, although he seemed to have a soft spot for Shion, reason for which Shion couldn’t figure out.

Although Rikiga, Inukashi, and Nezumi all didn’t get along, Shion liked spending time with all of them. He liked being around people.

“What do you mean?” He asked, before he realized what they were talking about. “Oh.” He looked down. “That. Yeah, it’s…” he shielded his face when the dog shook its fur, spraying water all over him. “It’s a bit of a long story.”

They huffed at the answer, crossing skinny brown arms over their chest and blowing a strand of hair out of their face irritably. “Whatever. You’re a weirdo, you know that?”

“So I’ve been told.”

“You show up out of nowhere with that asshole Eve—“

“Eve?”

“Nezumi.”

Shion blinked. “Is that his real name?”

Inukashi barked out a laugh. “No, of course not!”

“…Oh.”

They continued like he hadn’t said anything. “You show up out of nowhere with that asshole, with white hair and these— _birthmarks_ or whatever, acting nice to everyone and naïve as all hell, and you choose a job washing _dogs_.”

“I like dogs,” Shion explained weakly, but he smiled at the description they had used, completely unaware of what the word _weird_ was in his mind when referencing him. It was a freedom.

“Yeah, well, so do a whole lotta people around here, but you don’t see them offering to wash any for me…”

“Would you have enough to pay them if they did?”

They glared at him before he realized what he’d asked.

“Oh, no, sorry—that was rude of me, wasn’t it?”

“Whatever, airhead. Just finish up so you can go home already.” They pushed off the fountain and tossed a small bag to Shion—payment for the day. Shion caught it, leaning forward just a little too much so that he had to lean on the dog in front of him so he wouldn’t fall.

“Thank you!” He called, but they didn’t respond, only waving their hand to them over their shoulder while they walked away.

 

\--

 

Shion was so immersed in the book he was reading, he didn’t notice Nezumi coming home, up until the man sat down next to him on the couch and watched him as he read.

Those eyes were still so alluring. It was difficult to ignore that gaze.

Shion flipped the page and asked, “How was work?”

Nezumi shrugged in answer before changing the subject. “I didn’t know you were interested in Shakespeare.”

“Oh, I’m not really.” He dog-eared the page and set the closed book on the coffee table in front of them. “It just occurred to me that I don’t actually know all that much about literature, besides what I learned in Heaven.”

“And I’m assuming Heaven wasn’t too big on playwrights?”

“No, not really.” He smiled.

“You have a lot of catching up to do then.” Nezumi stood, and the small grin he gave Shion was accompanied by something else Shion couldn’t quite tell—an emotion he wasn’t too clear on. Amusement, maybe. Nezumi was amused a lot. It was a safe bet to say that would be what it was.

But, no. He’d seen Nezumi amused, and he knew very well what that looked like; but this didn’t have any condescending undertones. This was different.

“If you’re done staring, Your Majesty, I’m going to put dinner on now,” Nezumi said, turning around to flick on the stove.

“Did you read in Hell?”

Nezumi didn’t falter. “Of course.”

“What did you read?”

He pulled out a pot. Filled it with water. “Oh, all kinds.”

“From different eras?”

A nod. He reached up into the cupboard. “Shakespeare, Ibsen, Twain, Salinger, Wilde, Austen, Dickens—all kinds.”

“You like Shakespeare the most, don’t you?”

“You could say that, yeah.”

Shion hummed thoughtfully. There was silence for a moment. Nezumi stirred the pot.

“So, in Hell, they weren’t—no one was discouraged from reading, then? I mean, it was relatively easy to get your hands on a book, right?”

Nezumi snorted. “Of course not.”

Shion blinked, not that the other could see with his back to him. “How come?”

“Anything that makes living even a little less miserable is pretty hard to come across there, including hobbies like reading. Books and technology, anything recreational—probably the hardest things to obtain of all.”

“But you managed it anyway.”

“If you get bored enough, you find ways to manage. What about you, Shion? You said you hadn’t read all these in Heaven, but I’m sure they were encouraging this kind of stuff.”

“It was a bit more complicated than that.” He looked at the lines on his palms. “They weren’t _discouraged_ , but no one really had _time_ to do things like that—I mean, the War is still going on, even if doesn’t reach Earth anymore, so everyone was pretty busy, including me. Safu, though, she…” He felt his face fall. “She loved reading.”

“Safu,” Nezumi repeated the name. “That short-haired girl you were always hanging out with?”

“Yeah.” Shion’s voice felt softer than intended. “Her.”

They fell into silence after that, but just as they were both sitting down to eat, bowls in hand, Nezumi said, stirring his food with his spoon idly, “You miss her.”

“Of course I do.” Shion smiled, but it seemed forced even to him. “I spent two thousand years with her, and she was really the only friend I had. What about you, don’t you have anyone that you miss?”

“The only person who didn’t want me dead was you.”

“That’s not—“

“True?” He smirked, mocking. “You’d be surprised. Demons don’t _have_ companionship, and the closest I had to that was a few acquaintances here and there. We helped each other out if we needed it, but not without compensation, and then that was it. You were the only one to show interest in me that wasn’t hostile, so you can see why I was so confused by you.”

Shion swallowed his spoonful. “You liked being around me, though.”

“I did.”

“Why?”

“Going so long with out anyone who’ll have a decent conversation with you gets pretty tough. You were entertaining.”

Shion looked down at his soup, felt a lump in his throat. _Entertaining._ Nezumi had said that back then too, that he was just entertaining himself, but it didn’t feel true.

Nezumi was lying, but Shion couldn’t find it in himself to call it out. Instead, he forced the lump down and finished dinner in stiff silence, _entertaining, entertaining,_ bouncing around his head.

 

\--

 

“You’re beautiful.”

“Be careful,” Nezumi said, tying his hair up. “Saying things like that too often could give me a bigger head—or worse, it could give me the wrong idea.”

Shion frowned, turning the bathroom light off as he walked out. “I’m being serious, Nezumi—“

“And so am I.” He tied his shoes as he spoke, and Shion watched the way his muscles pulled tight when he bent down, the indent of his collarbone, the strands of hair he’d missed that fell in his face, and thought, _you’re beautiful_.

He said it again. “You’re beautiful.”

“You don’t have to say it twice, Shion, once is enough to get the point across.”

“I’m being serious.” He frowned.

“You think you’re the first one to tell me that?”

Shion shook his head. No, of course he hadn’t; Nezumi was attractive, both to Shion and the general public, and others weren’t always quiet about it, nor were either of the two unaware of the staring he sometimes got, the awkward flirting the girl at the grocery store tried on him.

“I didn’t think that. I just wanted to tell you.”

Nezumi stared at him for a moment, eyebrow raised like that answer was so unusual for him, as if he hadn’t gotten used to the odd behavior in the months they’d lived together. Shion didn’t look away this time, nor did he flinch under those silver eyes; rather, he welcomed them, felt himself wanting to keep looking.

Finally, Nezumi shook his head and looked down, breaking the spell that had somehow fallen on the two.

“Airhead,” he mumbled, but it sounded fond, even for him.

 

\--

 

Time spent on Earth passed, and Nezumi and his _complicated_ relationship developed; whether it was growing or reverting back to what it used to be, he wasn’t quite sure. Shion could admit to himself that there was a certain attraction he felt towards the other, magnetic like even if he wanted to, he couldn’t _stop_ wanting to be near him.

Now that he was human, it felt so much nicer to do things just because his emotions were telling him to. It caused a bit of problems, but it was such a change from in Heaven, polar opposites to the suffocating expectation that angels could not have emotions and could not act on impulses or _wishes_ ; now, here on Earth, he could act like that as much as he wanted. There would be consequences, but physically, _he could do that_. It was amazing. He used his new ability freely.

He said things he never would have said in Heaven; and he cried a lot, because he’d never cried before, or if he had it was before he’d been reborn, so _so_ long ago, and he let himself get angry when a response required it, and he let himself miss Safu and miss his mother and grieve no longer being with them. He mourned his mother’s death and might as well have mourned Safu’s, since there was no doubt that he would never see her again. He mourned the death of his old life but let himself be happy in the present; when he’d told Nezumi that he didn’t regret falling, he’d been telling the truth.

When he’d said all those things to Nezumi, about Nezumi loving him back and just being scared to admit it, he hadn’t been exaggerating or stretching to truth or tricking himself into believing something he knew wasn’t true—he really did believe that Nezumi loved him back, and even though he didn’t say it, he knew that he was right. Nezumi loved him, and he loved Nezumi, and he didn’t hate Earth.

Inukashi came up to him after he and Nezumi kissed the first time that morning, eyebrows furrowed at the ground as they walked. Shion liked to think that, after six months, the two of them were friends, even though he knew that they would be reluctant in admitting so. Despite their outwardly harsh words, they seemed to enjoy his company, and vice versa. He really was glad he’d met them in his time on Earth too.

“Did something happen with you two?” They asked, shuffling their feet in the dirt like they weren’t entirely committed to having this conversation.

“By ‘you two’ are you talking about Nezumi and me?” Shion hadn’t started washing any of the dogs, but a few of the puppies were currently running around him, playing while their mother sat a few feet away and watched.

Inukashi nodded stiffly. One of the puppies came up to them and licked their ankle. Smiling gently like they only did around their dogs, they bent down and picked it up, immediately seeming more relaxed.

“Nothing really _happened_ ,” Shion tried to explain. “Well, that’s a lie. We got in a—an argument, I guess…”

They frowned. “What—what happened?”

“Nothing that big of a deal,” he assured, waving it off. “Just some personal stuff. We’ll be fine once I get home, so it’s not like we’re really in a _fight_.”

“So you _are_ going to make up, though?”

“Of course.” He gave them an odd look. “Why wouldn’t we?”

“N-nothing.” They looked away. “It was stupid of me to even ask anyway. ‘S none of my business.”

“I don’t mind you asking!” He tried to reassure them, but they had already set the puppy back on the ground and were turning around to go back inside.

Shion sighed and went to start washing.

 

\--

 

Shion found out about Nezumi’s burn scars on accident.

He’d walked in on him getting out of the shower one night; Shion had only meant to pop his head in and tell him that his manager had stopped by to ask him about something, when his eyes had been drawn to the red patch of skin on Nezumi’s back, just below his shoulder blades like torn away wings.

Due to multiple circumstances, he’d seen Nezumi shirtless before, but it occurred to him that he’d only ever seen him from the front, and the one time he’d asked Nezumi to show him the scar from his rebirth (which he noticed now, right above where the towel hung on his hips, at the dip of his spine on his lower back), it had been dark, and Nezumi had only lifted his shirt up enough for that to be visible. Shion hadn’t even thought about him having any more.

Nezumi turned around at the sound of him at the door, his halted, _Someone’s at the door for you_ still on his tongue, but the damage had been done.

“What do you want?” Nezumi asked, voice surprisingly calm, even though there was no way he didn’t know that Shion had seen.

“I, um…” Shion licked his lips, looked away. “Your manager is at the door. He says he needs to talk to you about something for tomorrow.”

“Tell him it can wait. I’m busy.”

Shion nodded, and turned away, closing the bathroom door behind him. He frowned at the floor, but went back to the main entrance anyway, where the man was still waiting, fidgeting like he was uncomfortable being there.

“I’m sorry,” Shion said, hand on the doorway, “Ne—I mean, Eve’s still in the shower. He told me to tell you it could wait.”

The man frowned, his forehead creasing at the movement. He cleared his throat and refused to look Shion in the eye. “Ah, yes, well…thank you anyway…”

“Shion,” he filled in the gap.

“Yes, thank you, Shion.”

Smiling politely, he closed the door after the parting phrase, and leaned against it with a sigh. The image of the scar was still stuck in his head, and he chewed on his lip.

It occurred to him that he hadn’t actually known anything about Nezumi from before he was reborn. They’d met, and he’d saved him, but he never found out why he was in the woods during a thunderstorm bleeding like that in the first place, and while it had occurred to him in his other life that he didn’t know, he hadn’t thought about it since before falling.

The itch to ask, to find out, started, and he pushed away from the door, shaking his head. That would be rude, wouldn’t it? To ask about something so personal, something from his old life…

But he’d told Nezumi about his other life, hadn’t he? He’d told him everything he could remember, at least. And he couldn’t deny that he wanted to know. He wanted to know everything about Nezumi; he wanted Nezumi to trust him enough to tell him, and while he understood the fear of telling anyone, it still hurt to think that Nezumi had purposefully been hiding it.

After all, they were…

What were they? Shion made his way to the living room and lay down on the couch, burying his face in a pillow. He was thinking too much. He didn’t know what they were. Shion loved him, and they definitely passed the barrier of _platonic_ , but he wasn’t sure what to call it. They’d never talked about it.

Nezumi came out from the living room a few minutes later, a towel around his shoulders, using one end to rub his still-wet hair. It was down, hanging around his shoulders, and even though he had a shirt on, Shion couldn’t help but glance at his back when he turned around.

“Thank god he left,” Nezumi snorted, back to Shion as he reached towards one of the shelves. He fixed some of the books back where they were, as they’d fallen over after a while of leaning a little too far to the right.

Shion didn’t respond, distracted.

“He didn’t give you any trouble?”

“Hm?”

Nezumi turned around and gave him a weird look. It was unlike Shion to not pay attention, Shion knew that, but he wasn’t good at hiding things. “My manager. Did he say anything to you?”

He blinked and shook his head, sitting up so he didn’t take all of the room on the couch. “No, not really. Why do you ask? What do you think he would’ve said?”

“Oh, you know.” He sat down next to Shion, propping his feet up on the coffee table. “Two men, _living_ together, sharing a bedroom—seems suspicious, doesn’t it? I’m surprised he didn’t say anything about it.”

The ex-angel gave him a look, not understanding what he was getting at. “Not really.”

Nezumi raised an eyebrow, looking amused at the other’s confusion. “Of course. Excuse me, Your Majesty.”

“What are you…?”

Nezumi waited for him to think about it.

Shion thought about it. “Oh. _Oh._ You mean he noticed we’re,” he paused on the word, thinking about his earlier concern, “together?”

“Astute observation.” He grinned.

“That might explain why he wouldn’t look me in the eye.”

Nezumi laughed, surprising Shion, although the sound wasn’t unwanted. Shion watched him, not even trying to hide the way he was staring anymore.

“So we _are_ together?”

At the words, the ex-demon let his laughter die and turned to the other, giving him a look like he was asking another stupid question.

“I assumed we were,” he said, “unless it turns out that was only me.”

“No! I mean…” Shion looked down, biting his lip. “That’s not…I was just thinking, because we’ve never actually…”

“Shion.”

He looked up and there were lips pressed against his. He kissed Nezumi back, still not entirely sure what to do with his hands. They sort of faltered where he raised them to cup the back of Nezumi’s neck; he thought of the scar and felt his earlier eagerness to kiss dissolve just a little.

They pulled away.

“You still don’t think we’re together?”

“No, it’s not that…”

Nezumi frowned. “You’re thinking too much again, aren’t you.”

Shion looked away guiltily, knowing that that was the case. “It’s just…earlier, in the bathroom…”

There was silence for a moment, and then the rustle of Nezumi pulling back, the hand that had been on Shion’s retracting. He straightened up. “Oh. That.”

“When were you going to tell me?” Shion tried to tell himself to stop talking abut it, but the words came out anyway.

Nezumi shrugged, trying to look nonchalant. “I hadn’t thought about it.”

“So you _weren’t_ going to tell me.”

“It wasn’t important.”

“Nezumi…” He frowned, put a hand on the other’s. Felt the hand twitch under his. “Of course it’s important. Everything with you is important.”

“It’s just old baggage from my past life.” His voice sounded quiet. “It doesn’t matter anymore.”

Shion sighed. Neither spoke for a moment.

Unable to think of anything more to say, he leaned his head against the other’s shoulder, his forehead pressing into Nezumi’s collarbone, and brought a hand up to run through his dark hair. He carted through it gently, untangling strands when he reached a knot, and felt Nezumi relax into him.

“You’re upset that I didn’t tell you,” Nezumi finally said.

Shion didn’t stop what he was doing. His words were said into that shoulder. “I want you to trust me with—with everything.” He sounded selfish, he knew. He kept talking. “I want you to trust me enough to tell me about your past and things that are important to you, and to not be frightened of me and what I’ll do—or what you think I’ll do. I want you to come to me with things of your own volition, not because I cornered you into telling me.”

“Look at His Majesty, back to his big, bright vocabulary.”

“I’m serious, Nezumi.”

Shion didn’t look at him, but he could imagine that sarcastic smirk sliding off his face at the words. It was evident it was gone when he said, “I am too. It isn’t important.”

“Nezumi—“

“Not anymore, it isn’t.” He pulled Shion’s hand away from his hair, holding it instead. “The past doesn’t matter to me anymore.”

“You’re lying.”

He frowned. “It’s the truth.”

“You have dreams about your old life, don’t you?” Shion’s hand tightened around the other’s, squeezing it gently. “I know you do. It’s okay. And your scars…you don’t have to tell me where they’re from right now, I just—“ He looked down. “I’d like it if you would at some point. Please.”

“At some point…”

Nezumi seemed to think about it. Feeling his hesitance, Shion reach over and kissed his cheek.

“Whenever you’re comfortable telling me.”

“That might be a while.”

“I don’t mind.”

He gave Shion a look, but besides that, Nezumi didn’t protest anymore.

 

\--

 

“Inukashi?”

The two of them were walking out of the theater after one of Nezumi’s shows, Inukashi looking like they were ready to go home and crash. They hummed in response to Shion, yawning soon after.

“You don’t really ever talk about yourself,” Shion said. “How come?”

“Why do _you_ care?” Their response was immediate and just a little too harsh for what the situation required.

He looked away. “I mean, I guess I just figured—it feels like you know so much about me, but I don’t even know how old you are.”

“Don’t know and don’t care,” they grumbled, crossing their arms as the two of them began making their way to Inukashi’s hotel. Shion had gotten into the habit of walking with them on their way back from the theater.

“You really don’t know how old you are?” To be fair, Shion wasn’t really sure how old he was either, but he figured that was a bit of a different situation.

“I don’t know when I was born and I don’t know how old I am.” They uncrossed their arms, fidgeting like they were nervous, before stuffing their hands in their pockets. “If you wanted to, you could try and guess,” they offered, grinning like they thought Shion’s answer would be amusing.

“Hmm…” Shion thought about it for a moment, looking at them to try and judge their age. Now that he thought about it, they did look pretty young; it was easy to forget that when they always demanded such respect.

“I guess… you’re probably at least a teenager, right?”

They shrugged. “No idea.”

“I’d say you’re probably fifteen, maybe fourteen.”

“Why?”

Shion smiled. “I don’t know. It’s just a feeling I have.”

Huffing, they looked away, but their cheeks seemed a little darker than usual. “How old are you then, huh, airhead?”

“Eighteen,” he lied.

They gave him a look. “You don’t _look_ eighteen.”

“I’ve got a bit of a baby face, I suppose.”

“ _That’s_ an understatement,” they snorted. Inukashi rushed forward where they were walking to kick a pebble; it skittered across the dirt street and stopped. They kept kicking it as they walked, until it disappeared somewhere in a bush.

“Hey, Inukashi?” Shion asked, voice more serious than he intended. He could see their hotel in the distance.

“Yeah?”

“How did you end up…” he paused. “How did you end up living here, on your own? You’re pretty young…”

The two fell in silence as Inukashi seemed to think the question over, looking at Shion before looking at the ground in front of them. They kicked at the dirt, although there weren’t any more pebbles.

“I don’t remember much from when I was little,” they started, voice quieter and more serious than Shion had probably ever heard it. “Some old man—he took me in as a baby, I guess, and raised me at the hotel with a buncha dogs. I mean, he didn’t even really _raise_ me, ‘cause he sorta went off on his own all the time, but my mama…”

“Your mother?”

“She took care of me,” they said. “Raised me with all her other pups. She was a real good mama, and one day, the ole’ man just upped and left, leaving us alone. I didn’t care that much, but I never found out what happened to him. She raised me, as far as I care.”

Shion didn’t say anything.

“She died a year back,” they continued. “Buncha kids threw rocks at her and broke her legs, ‘cause she tried to steal some of their food, and that’s what you get when you mess with other people’s stuff, I guess. By the time she got back here, there wasn’t anything to do.”

“I’m sorry. She sounded like a really good mother.”

They looked at the ground. “Yeah, she was.”

 

\--

 

Nezumi sang Shion to sleep, once.

Much to Shion’s dismay, his memory of the time was hazy; he’d been half asleep, upset about something and just the smallest bit delirious, so when he woke, he was half convinced he’d dreamt the whole thing.

But the hand still holding his under the covers made him sure that it hadn’t been a dream—that had happened, just the night earlier. He’d woken up, crying and frightened out of his mind because of something, a vivid dream (hands reaching towards him, ripping at his shoulders, staring down the barrel of a gun, Safu, dismembered, his mother, gone, Nezumi, bleeding rusty red instead of charcoal black, a snake all blush pink and bruise blue slithering up his body and choking, choking, _choking him_ —) that had felt a little too real.

It took him a moment to come back to reality, to realize that none of that had actually happened, and that he’d lashed out at Nezumi in his panic. There was a red mark on his wrist where Shion had gripped hard enough to leave a bruise. He hoped it wouldn’t.

“Nezumi,” was the first thing he’d managed to say, croaked out of a hoarse, tearful voice, and Nezumi had nodded, wiping his tears with his thumb, caressing his cheek and keeping him safe.

“It’s me, Shion,” he assured.

“You’re okay.”

“I’m okay, Shion.”

“Y-you’re okay…you’re…” The ex-angel felt his eyes water, drip drip drip down his chin, flashes of the dream, images where Nezumi had laid dying, playing in his head.

“You’re okay,” he repeated, and that was that before he couldn’t breathe well enough to say anything else, and had to focus on keeping oxygen flowing to his brain even as he hiccupped in a sob and fell forward into the man in front of him.

Nezumi caught him.

Nezumi held him.

They stayed like that until the clock chimed two a.m. and Shion pulled away.

“I’m sorry,” he said, rubbing his eyes furiously to get rid of the evidence of his crying.

“I don’t know how I’m going to sleep now.” He tried for a laugh, but what came out was more of a sob. “God, I can’t stop thinking about it…”

The dark-haired man was quiet for a moment. “Lay down,” he instructed.

Confused, Shion did, curling his legs up to his chest as he lay on his side. He felt Nezumi get in behind him, so they were pressed chest-to-back, and Nezumi’s hand found his under the covers, fitting fingers together like they were made to.

That was when Nezumi started singing.

Shion had heard him sing before, of course, it was just that it was significantly _different_ when it was for him and not a whole audience, when it was something so quiet and soothing and _loving_ ; it reminded him of his mother, singing him old lullabies in their native tongue. Absentmindedly, he registered tears falling onto the pillow underneath him again.

He didn’t realize how alone he had been until he wasn’t anymore. Heaven was beautiful and holy and everything anyone could ever want, but it was lonely, _so lonely,_ when you were the only one who could feel, who even had the _ability_ to feel.

Nezumi had been lonely.

The lullaby ended.

Shion turned around and kissed him, soft like he could break and salty from his tears.

“Thank you,” he whispered, because nighttime was for whispering, even if they had no neighbors to bother, even if they had no one else but each other to think about.

“Go to sleep,” was all Nezumi said, before he pressed further into the other, insisting, and that silver hid behind pale eyelids, his breathing steady.

Shion pressed his hand to the other’s chest, his palm sliding right over where his heart was. He felt the pulse, the _thump thump thump,_ symphony of the living. It matched his own in time.

“Go to sleep,” Nezumi repeated, setting a hand on top of the one on his chest, but not moving it from where it was. Shion nodded finally.

“I will,” he promised. “Good night.”

“Good night, Shion.”

He drifted off with his palm pressed there.

 

\--

 

The first time his scars started acting up, he was making breakfast.

If he had been aware of anything outside of the excruciating pain all over, he would’ve noticed the spoon clatter from his hands onto the floor, would’ve heard the worried “Shion?!”that came from the bedroom, would’ve felt the arms that caught him as his legs buckled But he wasn’t aware, so he didn’t notice, didn’t hear, didn’t feel.

All he felt was pain.

_Mother, mother, mother, I’m sorry—_

_Shion? Shion? Shion—?_

_Wake up—!_

_You’re new here—_

_Stay out of our business—_

_Don’t move._

He was sure his brain was melting, his skin turning to fire, his muscles collapsing under the weight of his own body, his head collapsing under the weight of this _pain, so much pain_ —

“It hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts!”

Distantly, he could hear Nezumi’s voice, panicked and frightened, saying something about what’s going on, what’s happening, Shion, are you alright, Shion, Shion, you’re going to be okay, you’re not going to die—

It hurt too much. His brain was going to melt _right out of his head_ if he didn’t make it stop, kill me, Nezumi, kill me kill me kill me now please _kill me—_

_“Shion!”_

When he woke up, he was in their bed with a metallic taste of blood coating his mouth, his whole body aching, protesting being awake. Nezumi was passed out beside him in a chair right next to the bed, his head down with his eyes closed, his breathing steady but labored.

Shion tried to say, “Nezumi?” but his voice wouldn’t come, and it hurt too much to try again, so eventually he gave up and fell back asleep.

The second time he woke up, Nezumi was awake this time, reading a book as he sat in that same chair, and he bookmarked the page before closing it once he saw Shion was awake. The clock read 6:34 PM; he’d slept all day. This time, when he opened his mouth, the words came.

“Nezumi…? What happened?”

“You don’t know.”

He tried to remember, but all there was was _pain_ , and that didn’t explain what it had been that caused that. He shook his head finally.

“Your scars…started acting up. They looked exactly how they did when you first fell.”

“When I first…” He frowned. “That shouldn’t…”

“Happen?”

Shion nodded. Nezumi shook his head.

“I don’t know why it happened either. I’m just as confused as you—in fact, I’d been hoping you would know something about it once you woke up, but it seems both of us are on the same boat.”

“Everything hurts,” he grumbled, his tongue feeling heavy and making it difficult to talk.

“I could imagine.” Nezumi handed him a glass of water. He took it gratefully.

“Have you been taking care of me all day?”

“Pretty much.” The ex-demon shrugged, like it wasn’t a big deal. “I just had to call in to work with some bullshit excuse about being sick.”

“But, if you get fired—“

“That’s not going to happen, Shion, trust me.” He grinned, but it felt like a cheap imitation of what it usually was.

The rest of the day was a blur after that, and when he fell asleep that night, he couldn’t stop thinking about his brain melting under that pain.

 

\--

 

The second time his scars acted up, he was with Inukashi, which ended up being significantly worse than if he had been at home, because at least Nezumi knew what to do, sort of. Shion hadn’t been aware of much except the fire licking up his body in the shape of a snake, but he remembered, distantly, Inukashi’s voice, calling his name and cursing like that could somehow make the situation better.

Eventually, he passed out from the pain. He woke to a water-stained ceiling, the white not longer immaculate, and voices beside him arguing.

“What the hell d’ya even do to him?!”

“I didn’t do anything! He just collapsed in the middle of washing my dogs—wait, shhh, I think he’s waking up!”

“Wha…?” He blinked, turning his head in the direction of the voices. “Inukashi…? Ri-rikiga?” It was definitely them. He tried to sit up before his muscles screamed in protest and he fell back into the bed, comforter scratchy against his skin.

Inukashi released their breath, like they had been holding it for a long time. “You’re okay!”

“Oof!”

It took him a moment before he realized that there were arms around him, pulling him into a hug; Inukashi was hugging him, fiercely, and their shoulders shook.

“Y-you’re okay…”

He smiled a little and brought his arms up to hug them back. “Yeah, I’m okay,” he assured, voice scratchy. Looking over their shoulder, he saw Rikiga with his eyes a little watery too, sniffing and mumbling something about the dust in the air. “I’m okay.”

They pulled back and scrubbed their tears away a bit too aggressively, fixing him with an angry expression, masking relief. “Idiot! We thought you were going to die!”

“I’m sorry.” He looked down guiltily. “I didn’t mean to scare you two like that.”

Rikiga straightened up and fixed his bow tie, clearing his throat. “Yes, well...” His expression went from a steeled one to one of relief. He’d never been very good at acting. “I’m just glad you turned out alright.”

“Yeah.” Shion smiled at the two. “I am too. Thank you for taking such good care of me.”

“Airhead,” Inukashi mumbled, reaching over to a table beside the bed and handing him a small bottle. Shion looked at it in confusion, and they rolled their eyes, huffing.

“It’s just water, dumbass,” they assured. “We just didn’t have anything to put it in beside this asshole’s old beer bottles.”

He took a tentative sip, ignoring the indignant “Hey!” from Rikiga, and found that it _was_ actually just water, although it smelled strongly of alcohol. Realizing just how thirsty he was, he drank, and didn’t stop until the bottle was empty.

“Thank you,” he said, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. He had a massive headache, and when he tried to stand a moment later, his legs buckled underneath him. Inukashi caught him and helped him back to the bed.

“You can’t move yet,” they said, frowning.

“But I haven’t finished washing—“

“Who cares about the damn dogs!” Rikiga _tsk_ ed. “You’re obviously in pain, you’ll just have to stay here until you can walk on your own.”

Shion frowned. He wasn’t sure how long that would take, but it didn’t seem like it would be soon. “I’ve already caused you both so much trouble…”

“Yeah, which is why you’re gonna stay here until you’re okay.” Inukashi glared at him. “You can’t scare us like that and then try to leave the second ya get up.”

He kept eye contact with them, saw that they weren’t joking, and sighed in defeat. “You’re right,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

“Stop apologizin’ and go back to sleep.” Rikiga started to say something, but Inukashi pushed him out the door before he could. “My dogs’ll be keepin’ an eye on ya while I’m busy.”

“Thank you.” He smiled. They blinked before looking away, blushing.

“Whatever.”

 

\--

 

A week after the incident with Inukashi and Rikiga, Shion woke up to hushed voices outside the bedroom.

“ _…Shion…_ ”

He rubbed the sleep from his eyes and padded over to the closed bedroom door, but paused when he reached to open it, hearing a voice that sounded like Inukashi through the door, saying _“…Now tell me what’s going on with him_.”

There was more talking, words he couldn’t quite make sense of, but if he strained, he could just hear Nezumi’s sarcastic taunt, _“…Heard you cried into Shion’s arms…that right?”_

Inukashi’s voice came louder. _“Shut up! I thought he was going to die, give me a break!”_ At the reminder of what had transpired, he felt guilt bubble up in his stomach, and frowned at the wood floor. The two of them kept talking.

_“….bitter…couldn’t tell you…personal to him?...if you ask me_.”

_“I_ didn’t _ask you….right to know…middle of…my dogs!_ ”

Nezumi’s voice lowered after that, like he had suddenly remembered that Shion was just a room over. The ex-angel felt bad about eavesdropping, especially since they seemed to be having a pretty serious conversation, but…it was about _him_ , wasn’t it? He chewed on his bottom lip, contemplating listening to the rest of the conversation. They were talking about him, about his scars, about the situation that had started proving more and more troublesome. Half of him felt like he had the right to know; the other half felt guilty as all hell.

Eventually, he backed away from the door, still chewing on his lip, and made to lay back down in the bed and fall back asleep, but they were back to talking at a normal level, and from where he lay on the other side of the room he could just barely make out their discussion through the walls.

_“…not going behind his back!”_

_“Oh, but you are…”_

Shion shut his eyes tightly. Nezumi was tricking Inukashi into feeling bad about worrying about him, that much he could tell, and even though he knew he probably should’ve felt at least a little betrayed at the fact that they were sneaking around him, he couldn’t quite blame them; if the roles were reversed, he probably would’ve done the same. Shion had a lot of secrets. He felt bad for not coming clean to them, but there wasn’t much he could for the time being.

_“…worried about him…Shion will tell you when he’s ready…_ ”

“ _…you_ do _know what it was.”_

_“I do.”_

From where he lay, the white-haired man felt himself hold his breath, waiting to see what Nezumi would and wouldn’t disclose.

“ _…it can kill him?”_

Their voices were significantly quieter now.

_“…won’t…has to endure…_

_“Okay…”_ There was a pause. _“Okay.”_

After that, Shion rolled over and pulled his blanket over his head, blocking out anymore of the conversation. He fell asleep for another hour or so, and, once he’d woken up and asked Nezumi if someone had come by, didn’t mention that he knew Nezumi was lying about why Inukashi had been there. He felt just as guilty as they were.

 

\--

 

The night Shion put two and two together and realized that he was going to die in a few months or less, he was up in the living room. He hadn’t been able to sleep, because something about his early hypothesis seemed…off. That it was meant to make him hate Earth made sense, and that it got worse the more content he was made sense, but it _didn’t_ make sense for them to _continue_ getting worse. If they were supposed to be following his emotions, they weren’t doing a good job at it; his feelings had regulated, but the occurrences were only getting more frequent, and more painful.

So he was up, unable to sleep, trying to re-read _Macbeth_ , but that worked about just as well as sleep had. He couldn’t focus. His mind kept wondering even as his eyes flitted across the words, and more than once he found that he’d read a whole page without understanding or remembering any of it.

Defeated, he sighed and closed the book, laying it on the coffee table in front of him before flopping back on the couch. He stared at the ceiling with its stains from water leaking, all the times it had rained and dripped through. When it rained particularly badly, he and Nezumi had to put out buckets where the holes in the roof were the worst, and despite himself, he smiled at the memory. Nezumi always found a way to make even something as unpleasant as that feel comfortable.

Nezumi was home, he realized somewhat belatedly. Nezumi was his home now. He didn’t want to worry him like this, with his scars; he didn’t want to be a burden. Nezumi didn’t deserve to be worried about Shion all the time (and, for all his insistences that he didn’t care, Shion _knew_ he worried), unknowing whether or not Shion would be alive the next moment. They wouldn’t kill him, he didn’t think, but they didn’t know for sure…

They didn’t know for sure.

Shion’s eyes widened; he just barely made it to the sink in time to throw up.

He felt hot, terrified tears prick at the corner of his eyes at the revelation, string, unseeing, at the sink faucet. They were going to get worse. The scars weren’t increasing with his emotions; they were increasing with _time_. And at the rate they were going, it wouldn’t be long.

They were going to kill him, slowly, painfully.

But, no. He didn’t want that. He didn’t want to go like that. Not at the mercy of something else, of someone else’s agenda. Not again. It would not be like his first life. This time, he would go by his own free will.

He had to ask Nezumi to kill him.

 

\--

 

“Nezumi.”

“Yes, Shion.”

“You don’t honestly think these things can kill me, do you?”

“…Of course I don’t. What makes you ask something like that?”

“Nothing…”

“…”

“…”

“Shion.”

“Hm?”

“You’re not going to die.”

“I know, Nezumi.”

“You’re sure you know?”

“I know.”

“…I know that the situation sucks, but you’re…”

“Going to be okay?”

“Yeah. You’ll be fine. So stop thinking so much, airhead.”

“Mm.”

“…”

“…”

“…”

“…Nezumi?”

“What is it now, Shion.”

“I love you.”

“…Go to sleep, Shion.”

“You know that, don’t you? That I love you. Because I do. More than I’ve ever loved anyone.”

“I know.”

“Good…”

“I’m going to sleep now.”

“Good night, Nezumi.”

“G’night, Shion.”

 

\--

 

Telling Inukashi was more of an impulsive decision than anything.

He’d been playing with the idea of trying to explain it to them for a while, but it had just sort of…slipped out, one afternoon, because his scars had acted up again while he was washing their dogs—almost exactly mirroring the first time that had happened, except Shion was getting used to the pain and frequency of it, so he didn’t pass out (although, for what it was worth, it _had_ rendered him immobile).

They helped him limp into the hotel once he was well enough to stand, laying him down on the torn couch in the main entrance and rushing off to get him some water. When they came back and he’d finished downing the entire bottle, the first thing out of his mouth was, “Do you want to know what’s causing this?”

At the words, they blinked, and shifted awkwardly where they stood, seeming torn between wanting to say yes and wanting to say no. Despite all their grandiose attempts to convince any and every one they were unattached from the world, as well as hide their emotions behind a vulgar demeanor, they had gotten looser with the way they expressed emotion around Shion ever since they became friends. He could read them pretty easily now.

“I—…” They paused, and then nodded decidedly. “Yeah. Spill.”

And so Shion _did_ spill, explaining the idea of Heaven and Hell and angels and demons and his past and reincarnation and memories and emotions and falling and, finally, the scars he’d gotten from falling, the searing reminder that he was being punished every day he was here on Earth—even though it felt far from a punishment by that point; even though he’d decided that he maybe loved Earth even more than he’d loved Heaven now. It wasn’t an easy explanation; they shouted at him to stop bullshitting them for a while at first, saying that he was a bastard if he thought that was some sort of joke to mess around with them, but he showed them the full extent of his scars.

“Didn’t you ever think that there was something strange about—about me? The scars? They’re not normal, and what happens to me _isn’t normal_. You know that, don’t you, ‘kashi?”

They didn’t comment on the nickname, only staring at him with their eyebrows furrowed, and amidst all their immediate fury at him for supposedly messing with them, he saw a flicker of recognition, of belief, like they were thinking back on all the times Shion had let on that there was something off about him and Nezumi, and he said, “You know that. I know you do. It’s not human. You’ve known it the whole time, right?”

“I…” They licked their lips, eyes shifting back and forth between Shion and the closed entrance door, like they were considering running, away from him and away from the conversation. Information like that was difficult for humans to take in, Shion knew, and often caused violent reactions—but after a moment, their expression softened into something like defeat, and they whispered, “Yeah. I could tell.”

Shion let out a breath he hadn’t known he’d been holding. “Do you believe me then?”

“If I _did_ ,” they said, a little hesitantly, “would you…explain it more?”

“Of course.” He smiled in a way he hoped was reassuring; apparently, it was, because their shoulders dropped at the answer, relaxing, and they gingerly sat down on the seat across from him.

“Let me guess.” They crossed their arms. “Nezumi’s a demon.”

“What? How’d you know that?”

At Shion’s words, they actually blinked in surprise, like they hadn’t expected that answer. “I was just jokin’ actually, but honestly I’m not at all surprised that’s the case.”

“You—you could _tell_ what he is—was?”

“I mean,” they looked away from him. “You guys ain’t exactly _normal_ , if you haven’t noticed. You’re pretty weird, and you say stuff sometimes that just don’t make sense, and Nezumi—I mean, I’ve known him since he got here before you, and when he first showed up, he looked like he was ready to shank anyone who even _talked_ to him.” They snorted, seeming to remember something. “He almost killed me, first time I went to mess with the guy.”

Shion’s eyes widened at the information. Nezumi had nearly killed Inukashi first time they met?

And then he was giggling, trying to stifle it in his hand; it didn’t work, however, because a moment later he was full on laughing, feeling tears form at the corners of his eyes. He couldn’t _stop_ ; the prospect was just so funny, the knowledge that that had happened on more than two occasions with him trying to kill someone as a greeting. It was…so _like_ him.

“Wh-what? What’d I say?!”

Wiping a tear away, Shion said through remaining giggles, “Sorry, Inukashi, it’s nothing you said. I was just reminded of something. From when he and I first met.”

They wrinkled their nose. “Please, _don’t_ tell me.”

Shion laughed one last time at their reaction. “Okay, okay, I won’t. I’ll leave that story to tell to you later.”

He heard them mumble _never, preferably_ under their breath, but chose to ignore it.

“But yes, Nezumi was a demon, before he was—“ He searched for the right word. _Exiled_ seemed most appropriate, but he knew the other man would scoff at him for being dramatic, as if he wasn’t the dramatic one himself. “Before he was sent to Earth,” he settled on.

“And you were an angel.”

“That’s right.”

Inukashi snorted. “Well, that’s some cliché bullshit if I ever heard any.”

“…What?”

“Never mind. Keep talking.”

 

\--

 

Shion hardly got any work done that day. They spent a long time talking, explaining everything and answering all of Inukashi’s questions, about the after life and dying and Heaven and what it was like being an angel.

“Did it hurt, when you died?” Their voice was soft, inquiring and hesitant, very unlike their normal demeanor.

He grimaced. “Yeah,” he admitted. “I won’t lie and say it was only a little pain, or that it wasn’t horrifying, or that my last moments were peaceful but…” He smiled at them. “I guess I can’t say I have many complaints about it, you know? I got to met you and Nezumi because of it, after all.”

“You’d already met _him_ before,” they mumbled.

“That’s true. But, Inukashi…”

At their name, they looked up, confused at the sudden shift in the other’s voice, serious now.

“I’m really glad I got to met you,” Shion finished, completely honest, and watched their face light up in embarrassment.

“Wh-whatever,” they mumbled, turning away from him with much more force than probably necessary.

“So, yes, dying hurt,” he summarized, taking pity on them and changing the subject back. At the topic switch, they seemed to go back to being focused on interrogating him again.

“So does every one get turned into an angel?”

“Mm, no, not everyone.” He folded his hands in his lap. “Some get reincarnated into demons, like Nezumi—if they commit crimes and don’t repent for their sins, I assume, but not _every_ one gets reincarnated. I’m not sure what the logistics of it are, but it has something to do with your soul—maybe the predominantly pure ones go to Heaven and the predominantly corrupt ones go to Hell. Maybe it has to do with what you accomplished in your life. Maybe they’re chosen at complete random. Quite honestly, there’s no way for me to know.”

They huffed, seeming disappointed at the news of _no answer_. “That sucks.”

“Yeah.” Shion gave them a sympathetic smile. He was surprised, but not disappointed, that they seemed to be taking all the information better than earlier.

“So that’s what your scars are about then.” They frowned. “And it… _won’t_ kill you?”

Shion felt himself falter at the question, mind flashing back to that night, when he’d finally understood everything, after countless days of trying to predict its pattern, predict its cause.

He was going to die, if he didn’t do something, and he knew that he was.

“No, it won’t kill me.”

The lie seemed to soothe them. They nodded. “Okay. That’s….that’s good. Does it…does it still hurt you? When they act up, I mean.”

“Of course they do.” He smiled softly, and their face dropped. “But I’m getting used to it. My level of pain tolerance has definitely gone up, I’d think. I don’t even pass out anymore.”

Inukashi didn’t say anything for a moment, frowning at the ground with their arms crossed over their chest still. He saw their knuckles turning white where they were digging their nails into the flesh on their forearm. “That’s—that’s _bullshit_.”

Shion blinked at how angry they sounded. It wasn’t uncommon for them to get pissed off, but they sounded a thin line away from furious. “What?”

“That’s bullshit! It’s bullshit!” They turned to him, eyebrows furrowed, voice scratchy and too loud. “That’s not fair for you to have to go through that! You don’t—you shouldn’t be…”

“It’s not _that_ big of a deal,” he lied. He prayed that he wouldn’t have to tell them about him dying, or that he could find something that could save him before it happened, so that it wouldn’t even be necessary to disclose that information in the first place. He had time before it would start killing him. He could put it off.

(That was a lie too. It had already started killing him; from the moment he’d fallen, he had been dying.)

“Yes, it is!” They insisted, leaning forward in their seat, seemingly without realizing it. “You’ve done jack shit to have this happen to you—I mean, if anything…” Abruptly, they stopped in the middle of what they were saying, apparently having run out of steam, and didn’t finish verbalizing the thought.

“It’s just how it is right now,” Shion placated.

“Whatever. Why did you even _tell_ me about this in the first place, huh?”

He looked away. “I felt like you had the right to know, since you’ve seen it happen with me, and you’ve just been blindly trusting what I say since then.”

“I’ve not been _trusting_ anything,” they grumbled, but the objection sounded hollow.

“Anyway…” Shion stood up, looking at the cracked clock hanging on the wall. “Oh—shoot, it’s almost four!” He swore he heard them mumble something like _who the fuck even says ‘shoot’?_ under their breath, but chose to ignore it.

“You need to go now, huh?” Inukashi snorted. “Spent the whole day talkin’ to me, didn’t even get any fuckin’ work done.”

“Aww, that’s not true, I washed a few dogs.”

“Yeah, a few out of a hundred.”

He smiled. “I’ll see you later, okay? And to make up for taking the day off, I’ll work tomorrow for free.”

“You better, airhead.”

 

\--

 

Shion, in all honesty, had not expected to see Nezumi react the way he did to the news.

He had expected him to be upset, of course, but the reluctance to admit they’d done everything they could, and his physical illness in response—that, Shion hadn’t anticipated.

And the crying.

That wasn’t anticipated either.

Nezumi had admitted to loving Shion for the first time too. Funny, how something that would normally make him so happy only brought him sadness; funny, how the one thing he’d been wanting _so badly_ to hear for the last six months had finally been out in the open, in the midst of announcing his execution. He couldn’t enjoy the way the word _love_ in relation to Shion rolled off Nezumi’s tongue; he couldn’t enjoy the way Nezumi kissed him with more emotion than he probably ever had.

He was dying.

Even as they tripped over the bathroom threshold into their shared room and Nezumi, never even once breaking from their kiss, all but shoved Shion back onto the bed, grabbing at his clothes in a silent urge of _take it off_ , he was dying.

Nezumi kissed down his neck, nearly tore their clothes off, pulled him up further on the mattress. He was dying.

Nezumi whispered over and over again _I love you_ like now that he had said it once he couldn’t stop saying; Nezumi pressed into him, gentle, passionate and soft like he was afraid of breaking him, wrapped his arms around Shion’s waist and pulled them close. He was dying.

Nezumi ran fingers up his spine.

He was dying.

Nezumi peppered kisses on his cheek at the pink scar sitting there.

He was dying.

Nezumi followed the trail of the snake all the way down to his hips.

He was dying.

“I love you.”

_I’m dying._

“Shion...”

_I’m dying._

“I—Nezumi…I-I love…”

Nezumi pressed their chests together, getting the two even closer, if that were possible. “You too—love you too…”

Then there was a feeling like lightning crawling up his spine, and Shion had a moment of fear where he thought his scars were going to start hurting, especially when they were both _so close_ and Nezumi was saying he loved him, more than once, over and over actually—but then the pain didn’t come. Instead, the lightning spread until it was in his fingertips where he was digging his nails into the flesh of his lover’s back, and he felt Nezumi jolt against him at the shock of electricity that accidently bled from his fingers, like if one were to stick a fork in an electrical socket. Nezumi didn’t say anything about it, which Shion was thankful for, as he was unable to form any coherent thoughts, let alone an explanation.

 

When they were tired and panting, Nezumi flopped over him, wrapping arms around his torso comfortingly.

“What—what was the…?” Nezumi started to ask, but he was too out of breath to finish the sentence. Shion knew what he was referring to.

“Don’t know,” he mumbled, honest, and hoped that he would be too tired to question Shion further. Apparently, he was, because the ex-demon only nodded in response, pressing his face into the crook at Shion’s collarbone, the junction where his shoulder and neck met.

“It…” Shion frowned. He tried to say _it felt like when I was an angel_ , but he was too tired to form coherent sentences, so instead, he let his eyes close and held tighter to Nezumi.

“Don’t got to sleep yet, airhead.”

Shion groaned in response, half-asleep but waking himself up. “’M tired.”

“We need to shower.”

“Do it in the morning.”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t really _enjoy_ sleeping covered in come.”

Even as he was only half conscious, Shion wrinkled his nose at the vulgar words. “You’ve done it before.”

“Yes, and I hated it, so I vowed to never again. Get up. We’re showering.”

True to his word, Nezumi pulled himself off of the other and started towards the bathroom. When Shion didn’t move, he stood at the bathroom door, still naked, leaning with his arms crossed over his chest like he was about to chastise Shion for being lazy.

“C’mon, you’re covered in filth.”

Shion threw his forearm over his eyes. “Can’t move.”

“That’s bullshit.”

He hummed. “You can call it bullshit all you want, but it’s your fault I’m like this.”

“Would it please His Majesty if I were to carry him to the shower?”

Said boy peeked out from beneath his arm to judge Nezumi’s expression, trying to see if he was being serious in his proposal or not. When Nezumi only grinned in response, he huffed. “You’re not serious.”

“Now, why would I offer something like that, if I wasn’t up to going through with it?”

Shion gave him one last look, before lifting his arms up in front of him. “Go on then. Carry me.”

“As you wish.”

Nezumi’s skin was cold pressed against Shion’s, who felt like he was constantly overheating, and, surprisingly, the ex-demon had little to no issue picking him up and carrying him to the bathroom, where he was set down gently like Nezumi was afraid to break him. And from the look he had on his face, he probably was.

Shion smiled. “Hey, are you thinking too much again?”

“It’s hard not too,” he admitted, getting in the shower along with the other, and turning the water on. They showered together often, because they had very little warm water to spare.

“Don’t think about that right now.” Shion wrapped his arms around him from behind, pressing his cheek into Nezumi’s back. He tried not to look at the scars. “Just be with me for a while. As long as you can.”

“Of course, Shion.” His shoulders sagged.

The showers they took were never too long, because within ten minutes it was ice cold anyway, so there really was no ulterior motive when they bathed each other. It was comforting, mostly, but this time, Shion kept feeling like Nezumi was staring at his scars more than usual, like if he looked at them long enough it would give him a solution.

_“We’ll find another way! We’ll get rid of the scars, we’ll make them stop hurting, we’ll do_ something _—”_

Those words, which had only been said a few hours earlier, rang clear in his head. He wasn’t sure how willing he was to believe there was even another way to find.

“Hey,” Nezumi said, voice soft.

Shion forced himself to stop thinking about it. “Hm?”

“Are you okay?”

He blinked. “Yeah, of course, I’m just…”

“Liar.”

He sighed. Nezumi was right. “It seems sort of redundant to have asked me something like that if you already knew the answer.”

“Be with me for a while.”

Shion smiled at his words parroted back to him. “Of course, Nezumi.”

 

\--

 

The time in limbo between normal life and Shion’s possible demise was spent with a weird sense of domesticity, like his scars were being patient in letting him play house with Nezumi and Inukashi. The calm atmosphere was only superficial, though, because as the days passed, they all knew what was coming, creeping up closer and closer, and what would happen if Shion ended up being unable to stop it.

Shion didn’t mention it to the others, mostly because he knew neither of them really liked talking about the topic, but he was practicing what little magic he had left, to make sure that it was there at all. The leftover electricity from when he was an angel only showed up when his emotions were in complete chaos, the irony of which was not lost on him. It made sense, then, that if he wanted to have any form of control over the dregs left of his magic, he would have to put himself under an awful lot of emotional distress daily.

This, in general, entailed a lot of brooding, and letting things upset him that he wouldn’t normal let upset him, like the dishes being left out, or a comment just shy of insensitive. He ended up lashing out more as a result, and crying more frequently too, but Nezumi didn’t seem all that unforgiving of him. He must’ve just thought it was the stress of everything getting to him—which was definitely part of it, but not all.

That was fine with Shion. He didn’t _like_ getting in more arguments with Nezumi, but he had to keep himself like that if he wanted it to work.

(The only time he wasn’t consciously trying to make himself more worked up about things was during sex. That particular activity seemed to do enough on its own without him making any changes.)

His pain tolerance was definitely adjusting too. By the time it was mid January, he never blacked out at it, and while it was still painful as all hell, it was getting easier to block out the pain if he really wanted to. In fact, if it happened while he was in the middle of doing something, he could sometimes manage to ignore it enough to continue. Some days would go by where he would endure it while washing dogs, and Inukashi wouldn’t have any clue it happened at all.

If he was standing, though, that was a different story. His legs always seemed to give out too easily.

Outside of his growing tolerance, they started happening while he was asleep, something that was new to both him and Nezumi, who often had to wake him up in the middle of the night due to his scars glowing. It didn’t feel the same as when he was awake. More often than not, he didn’t wake up from the pain, but endured it while asleep, which ended up causing some odd nightmares. A lot of them were about his mother, but he wasn’t really sure why.

Whenever Nezumi woke him up, they would spend the rest of the night pressed together, sometimes with the other humming against Shion’s shoulder, but it felt more like it was for Nezumi’s benefit than his. He wasn’t as bothered by the scars anymore, at least not as much as he should’ve been. Nezumi seemed to be the most affected by it.

That wasn’t to say Inukashi wasn’t too—because they were, more than Shion had expected, but they weren’t as good at showing it. They mumbled to themself when they thought he couldn’t hear and stared at him with their eyebrows furrowed when they thought he wasn’t looking, and they started tagging along to Nezumi’s shows with Shion more often and with significantly less sincere complaining.

He was starting to think Nezumi and them were getting along better, and if they weren’t, they were doing an awfully good job at pretending they were. The banter was still as present as ever, but it seemed much less hostile and genuine, and much more like they were just arguing for the sake of presentation. Inukashi ended up at Nezumi and Shion’s house about as much as the two were there themselves, and if they weren’t at the house, they were at Inukashi’s hotel—and if they weren’t at the hotel, they were at the theater. Somehow, the three always ended up together, whter they planned it or not.

Shion told Inukashi a lot of stories about when after he was reborn, almost all of which Nezumi scoffed at, before, due to some prompting from Shion, he added “detail” to it, little bits of information that the other forgot to put in, or an explanation on events that Shion hadn’t gotten to fully experience himself. Inukashi acted like they weren’t interested in hearing it, but whenever Shion started a story, they waited until he was done before complaining. They still seemed apprehensive about believing what the two were saying, like they were afraid one day he would tell them it was all an elaborate prank, but the more Shion and Nezumi talked, the more they seemed to trust what they were saying.

It got to the point where they were actually actively asking questions, instead of just letting the two talk, so that Shion started feeling a little bit like a teacher; he wasn’t complaining, of course, because he loved seeing Inukashi getting interested in something besides food and their dogs, especially since it was rare, and it was sort of fun to be knowledgeable about something for once.

It felt like he hardly knew anything about the real world, so he was always relying on Inukashi and Nezumi (and sometimes Rikiga) to explain things or to keep him out of trouble. Rikiga never held it against him when he had to ask questions about seemingly obvious things, but the other two had an air around them like it was _such_ a hassle to explain everything; Nezumi usually gave him this look, like he was surprised he hadn’t caught on yet, and Inukashi scoffed more often than not and mumbled something about figuring it out himself before giving in and telling him.

As time went on and he started learning about Earth and how things worked without them, they got better at not having such an attitude around it, like he was a child the two were babysitting. It it still felt nice to know more than them for once, though, even if he knew their teasing had never had any real malicious intent.

Inukashi was the most interested in the things Shion had seen over the thousands of years; they asked questions about history while trying to word it in such a way that they didn’t seem to care.

Nezumi liked to make things up, boasting like he had met Shakespeare when Shion knew very much that that was _not_ true, just because he knew there was no way Inukashi could disprove it. That was usually when the two got in little arguments, and Shion would have to find an excuse to get one to go in another room.

The days rolled by, and it was officially the dead of winter.

No one brought up what would happen in spring.

 

\--

 

“Do you want to know what my scars are from?”

Shion glanced up from behind the deck of cards he was currently shuffling; they had found a pack, dirty and missing a few cards, but still in good condition, outside at the market earlier that day, just lying in the middle of the walkway for them to take. Nezumi was sitting across from him at the coffee table, his hair loose from its bun and falling across his shoulders, dark and smooth.

“You mean…you’re okay with telling me?” His hands didn’t stop messing with the cards, even as he stopped paying attention and instead locked eyes with the other.

Nezumi shrugged. “It’s been an awfully long time since you found out I had them. I think it’s been long enough.” He grinned. “Besides, we’re married, aren’t we? Aren’t married couples supposed to tell each other everything?”

Shion felt himself smile back. “I guess you’re right about that. Whenever you’re ready.” He dealt the cards out between them on the table.

“Oh, let’s see…” Nezumi picked up his hand, moving them around in what Shion assumed was some sort of order. “Where should I start?”

“From the beginning.” The ex-angel picked up his own hand. He wasn’t very good at cards; the two were mostly playing for lack of anything better to do on a Sunday morning.

Nezumi took a deep breath. “You go first.”

Shion put a card facedown on the table. “One two.”

“You ever heard of the Mao Massacre?” He put his cards down. “Two threes.”

Shion shook his head, frowning. “I haven’t, no. Two fours.”

“Well, obviously, it was a long time ago, seeing as this was my last life. Two fives.”

“Bullshit.”

Nezumi raised an eyebrow at him before nodding to the pile. “Check.”

Shion did, and ended up taking all the cards.

“I’m from the Mao Clan,” he said. “Of course, you wouldn’t hear about it anymore, since I’m the last one alive—and only debatably so.”

The white-haired boy frowned. “You’re alive.”

“Only through unfortunate circumstances. I should’ve just had my soul thrown into the void like most people, instead of being reborn as a demon.”

Shion didn’t say anything for a moment. “It’s your turn,” he reminded, when Nezumi didn’t do anything.

“One six.”

“One seven.”

“I was the last known survivor at the age of six, maybe younger. I can’t remember too well anymore, but I was pretty young.”

“How’d they die?” Shion’s voice was quiet, not wanting to prod too much.

“Murdered. Set on fire.”

“That’s horrible!”

“Two eights. Yeah, I thought so too. I survived, but not before I got the scar you saw.”

“So that’s what…”

Nezumi nodded. “It’s your turn.”

He set his card down. “One nine.”

“The people that had murdered us—they wanted us dead, out of their land, but once they’d found I’d survived, they had more practical uses for me.”

Shion felt a little nauseous.

“Two tens. I escaped a while after that and—“

“Met me.”

“Met you, yes. They’d hurt me when I was running away, and I’d thought I was going to die with an infected gash in my arm in the middle of nowhere, but it was better than dying with them.”

“One jack.”

“And then, of course, you saved me, and I went on to pursue the Mao’s murderers.”

Shion bit his lip. “Did you…”

“Did I kill them?” Nezumi raised his an eyebrow. “Of course I did, but not before they took me down with them. Two queens.”

“Is that how you died?”

He smiled sarcastically. “Impeccable inference, Your Majesty, as always.”

“Three kings.”

“Bullshit.”

Nezumi checked the stack and ended up taking it.

“So that’s why you ended up as a demon? Because you murdered them?”

“Correct again.”

Shion looked down, frowning. He’d known that to get reborn as a demon you had to do something pretty bad, but for some reason, it didn’t feel severe enough to land him in Hell. Did the ones who murdered his family end up as demons as well? If they didn’t, why not? They seemed significantly worse than Nezumi.

But then again, Shion hadn’t _really_ known what Nezumi was like before he was reborn. He could’ve been an entirely different person back then, very much unlike the man he knew right now. It felt weird to think about.

“One ace.” Nezumi’s voice was quiet, like he was trying not to upset the other, when he asked, “Are you disgusted by me? Knowing that I killed people?”

“No, of course not.” Shion was quick to defend. “I could never be disgusted by you. It wasn’t your—“

“Fault? “ He smiled sardonically. “No one _made_ me kill them, Shion. I could’ve let them live, and then I wouldn’t have ended up a demon, or dying so early for that matter. I could’ve hade mercy and found forgiveness for them. Isn’t that what you’re supposed to tell me to do? To forgive them of their sins and love unconditionally?”

“They didn’t deserve for you to forgive them.”

Nezumi blinked, apparently having not anticipated that response.

Shion continued. “They murdered your family, and did horrible, awful things to you…” He was half aware of his fingers digging into the back of his cards. Thinking about it, about what they’d put Nezumi through, made his blood boil. “Honestly, they’re long dead, and _I’m_ not even sure I forgive them. I don’t think that you should’ve killed them, no, but…” He relaxed his hands and tried for a smile. “But then we wouldn’t have known each other, right? If you hadn’t been reborn a demon, I wouldn’t have gotten the chance to fall in love with you.”

The dark-haired man was quiet at that, mulling the words over.

Shion set a card down. “One two.”

 

\--

 

“Don’t just _say_ stuff like that!”

Both he and Inukashi stopped, frozen, once he’d realized what he’d said. They were staring at him, eyes wide and evidently surprised to hear him yell.

“I’m sorry,” he said, looking down apologetically, “I didn’t mean to raise my voice. It’s just…” He shook his head. “Never mind. I’m sorry for saying anything.”

“Are you okay?”

He blinked. “What?”

Inukashi shifted where they sat, legs crossed on the ledge of the broken fountain that took up half the space in front of their hotel. “You’ve just been…more snappy lately. Gettin’ defensive real easy.”

“Oh.” He pushed a strand of hair out of his face, watching the dogs—all of whom he was supposed to shave today—run around, nipping at each other as they play-fought, while some of the older ones sat in the shade of a nearby tree. It was getting warmer, and as the temperature rose, they would need haircuts to keep from overheating. “I’m fine. I’ve just been stressed out a bit lately, I guess…”

They pulled their knees up to their chest, resting their chin on them. “You’re worried about spring.”

“Of course not.” He tried for a smile. “What gave you that idea?”

They snorted. “We’re _all_ worried for spring, dumbass.”

“’All’ being you and Nezumi.”

A frown. “Right. Me and Nezumi.”

“You don’t need to be worried, though. I’ve got things handled.”

They gave him a look. “You can be a _really_ bad liar.”

“I’m not lying!”

“You ain’t lookin’ at me. That means you’re lyin’.”

He huffed and made a point to make eye contact with them when he repeated, “I’ve got things handled.”

Inukashi studied him for a moment, like they were thinking over whether or not trust what they were saying, before they seemed to come to a conclusion. They sighed, over exaggerating and loud, and got up from the fountain ledge. “Whatever you say, airhead. I’m goin’ inside.”

“Inukashi!”

They stopped at the door of their hotel, their hand hovering over the doorknob. “What is it _this_ time?”

“I’m sorry.” He caught their eye. “For earlier. I didn’t mean to yell, or start an argument. I was out of line.”

There was a moment of silence before they seemed to accept his apology, sighing again. “’S fine. I ain’t mad.”

But the door shut behind them like they were.

 

\--

 

The days were dwindling. The snow thawed completely.

 

\--

 

He’d looked into multiple churches to be either his place of rebirth or his final resting home, but the ones in town were all used and almost always preoccupied by at least one person. He didn’t want to be around others; in fact, he would’ve rather not been around Nezumi and Inukashi at all if he could choose, but he also realized he needed them, so they stayed.

Inukashi told him of an abandoned church on the top of a hill, right at the city limits. It was perfect.

The day set for Doomsday was April 5th. Why he chose that specific day, he wasn’t sure, but they needed to go off of something, a date to plan their lives around, and by the time April rolled around, he was in enough pain for it to be a sufficient time to act.

That morning was quiet. The three rode the bus in silence, unresponding to the white noise of those around them, the few other passengers present. A woman next to Shion spoke on the phone to someone, talking about her job interview. An old man across from them stared out the window, eyes unfocused and glossed over, unseeing, lost in thought. Shion could feel a little girl in the seat behind them staring at him— _Look, Mommy, that boy has white hair! Is he an old man?_ he heard her ask. Her mother reprimanded her for pointing—no, honey, that’s rude, don’t talk about strangers like that, don’t point at people, leave it alone. Nezumi’s hand shifted into his where they sat pressed next to each other. Inukashi fell asleep with their head on Nezumi’s shoulder on accident, and then proceeded to deny ever having done such once they’d woken up.

The trek up the hill to the church’s wide doors felt like walking in quicksand; he had shackles around his ankles, pulling him down and telling him not to go _, not to go_ , his hypothesis could still be wrong, technically—and the shackles fell off when the scars started. Nezumi had to help him the rest of the way once he couldn’t walk on his own.

Staring at the altar felt like staring at the face of his executioner. _Have you come here to die?_ it seemed to say, taunting, with its torn up bibles and rotted pews, stained glasses windows with spider webs that felt like they were trying to suffocate him; he felt those spiders crawl into his throat, and he had to cough several times to make sure that hadn’t actually been real.

He tried to stand up from where the two had helped him limp to one of the only still standing pews. “I’m fine now,” he said, but it sounded less reassuring with his voice hoarse and scratchy, and made his way to sit at the altar.

_You’re not going to kill me,_ he thought to his scars, sitting in front of the slab, fully aware of the dirt accumulating on his clothes. _I’m not going to die here. I’m going to live on after this, with Nezumi and Inukashi and Rikiga, and I’m going to walk out of here and go back to that house again. You’re not going to kill me._

Nezumi made some comment about laundry. Shion half wanted the two to leave as soon as possible so he could get it over with, and half wanted them to stay with him and never leave.

He reassured Inukashi he would be okay, and the two turned to leave.

_It’s your turn to cook tonight_ , Nezumi said.

Shion settled down where he sat and let himself get upset, let himself get overemotional to the point where the electricity started, and he focused the energy on his scars—visualizing them, imagining the red snake coiled around his body uncurling and disappearing, imagining the pain subsiding and his legs working again. His vision started to go blurry. The electricity in his fingers spread up his body in the line of the snake.

_Those will not be Nezumi’s last words to me,_ Shion thought. _I will see him again. Nezumi, Inukashi—wait for me._

And the world went white.

 

\--

 

The first thing Nezumi was aware of when he came to was the sound of retching from beside him.

Inukashi threw up for a good five minutes before they finally stopped and wiped their mouth with the back of their hand. Nezumi wrinkled his nose at them, fully aware of the horrible migraine he was sporting. His head felt like it was bursting, like someone had stuck a bunch of pins in his brain.

“What the _hell_ just happened?!” They demanded, once they’d realized he was awake and wincing in pain. Their voice was hoarse from the heaving.

Nezumi shut his eyes, pinching the bridge of his nose to try to relieve the pain some. “No yelling.”

They huffed, glaring at him, but lowered their voice. “What _was_ that? Did you—did you _see_ all of that?”

“You’re not a special snowflake, Inukashi. Yes, I saw it.”

“Did it…” They frowned. “Did it feel like you were…?”

“What, like I was Shion?”

They nodded, looking confused, and then angry from the confusion. “Yeah.” They glanced at the doors of the church, which they’d only seemed to have left a few minutes ago, but it might’ve been more like hours. The sun was high in the sky. They’d gotten there in the morning. “’S gotta be something to do with whatever the hell is happening in there right now…”

“Astute observation.” Nezumi stood up, rolling his shoulders and popping his neck.

“Should we…” They frowned. “Should we go check on him?”

“No. We need to leave him. Just because we got a shit ton of his memories doesn’t mean we should interrupt him and risk something bad happening because of it.”

“Yeah, whatever…”

The two ended up lying around outside the church doors, not speaking for the majority of the time. There was no sound from inside the abandoned building. Nezumi frowned, thinking back to the—the _memories,_ or whatever it was they saw—where Shion passed out right after they left. Was he lying on the floor in there, unconscious? Was whatever he did working?

“So,” Nezumi said, after about twenty minutes of complete silence. “You saw all of them.”

They nodded, looking solemnly at the ground, knees pulled up to their chest. They nudged a rock with their toe halfheartedly. “Yeah.”

“Including…”

They punched him in the arm. “Yes, includin’ _those_ , you asshole! ‘S not like I _wanted_ to know that much ‘bout your stupid relationship and whatever the fuck—stop lookin’ so smug, you damn rat!”

 

\--

 

When nightfall came and Shion still wasn’t making any signs of the process being over, they started to worry, and risked heading inside to check on him just to see if he was all right.

He was still sitting up right, eyes closed, in that same position they’d left him. If it wasn’t for the slight rise and fall of his chest and the steady pulse, Nezumi would’ve thought him dead, as he didn’t response, and he couldn’t move. They slept in the church that night, camped out on the floor in front of the pews, nibbling on slices of bread for dinner.

Inukashi and him weren’t exactly the best of friends, but he still thought that there was more of a sense of camaraderie between them, now that they’d seen each other through Shion’s memories, seen what they were _really_ like, at least around their common interest.

Conversation that night was less hostile, less arguing and more actually conversing. It was a shame Shion wasn’t there to witness it; he would’ve loved to see them getting along for once. He was always trying to get the two to become friends and find something in common. Well, they finally had—and, of course, he wasn’t even conscious to experience it. The irony wasn’t lost on Nezumi.

The next morning rolled around. Shion didn’t move. They stayed in the church, and took turns going back to get more food, as they hadn’t planned on staying there for longer than they already had.

The next day rolled around. Shion didn’t move.

The next day. Nothing.

By day four, they were getting scared that he had gone into a coma or something else like that, but they couldn’t take him to a hospital either, so they were stuck, waiting, watching him with baited breath.

Inukashi didn’t eat much that night. Nezumi didn’t say anything about it, but nudged the left overs toward them.  
“Eat,” he ordered.

They glared at him. “Don’t tell me what to do. You ain’t my mom.”

His voice tilted up into a higher pitch, higher—his Eve voice. “Little one, you have to eat your dinner or you won’t get any dessert.”

“Shut the fuck up.”

“Oh, dear, we’re touchy tonight, aren’t we.”

“I’m _stressed out_ , okay?! Just leave me alone!”

“What, you’re worried about dear Shion?” He leaned forward, flicking a strand of their hair over their shoulder. They slapped his hand away. “Oh, that’s right, isn’t it? You go soft when it comes to him. He melted your poor icy heart, didn’t he?”

“Damn hypocrite,” they snarled. “actin’ like you’re any better than me when you’re _not_. You saw me, but don’t forget I saw _you_ too!”

Nezumi took a bite of his food faux-nonchalantly, not saying anything. “Congrats, you know _all_ about us. Quite honestly, it doesn’t matter to me whether or not you saw.”

“You’re an asshole. I know you’re worried about him, even if you’re too damn stubborn to admit it. I know you cried when he told you.”

His teeth clenched. “Inukashi—“

They laughed humorlessly. “Oh, yeah, you went _on_ about how pathetic it was that I cried the first time he got hurt in front of me, but you sobbed like a baby when he told you! That’s more than I did, that’s for sure!”

“ _Drop it_.”

At the tone of his voice, they stilled, a glimmer of fear flashing across their face, before they hid it and crossed their arms. “Whatever.”

Just because they were right about him being worried didn’t mean he was going to admit it out loud.

 

\--

 

The fifth day, Shion finally moved.

Inukashi had been taking a nap with Nezumi on guard duty when Shion shifted, his hands twitching to go up to his throat, where they hovered there like he was miming strangling himself. Nezumi kicked Inukashi awake.

“What the fuck, asshole!” they grumbled, sitting up and rubbing their side.

“Shion’s moving,” he said. They stopped, their eyes flitting around until they landed on the boy, and he saw them inaudibly gasp.

“Holy shit,” they whispered. Shion’s eyes were still closed, but he started to get up, like he was sleepwalking. Nezumi knew his knees were going to buckle even before they did, and he was there to catch him just as he fell.

He collapsed into Nezumi’s arms, deadweight like a ragdoll, head lolling back like his body had shut down. Inukashi helped him to set Shion down, spreading out a blanket one the ground and laying him gently on it.

“He’s still breathing,” Nezumi said. “And his pulse is normal.”

“Why the hell didn’t he wake up if he was moving?”

Nezumi shrugged. “Dunno.”

“So, is he…is he _ever_ gonna—“

“He’s going to wake up.”

At the words, Inukashi pressed their lips together into a thin line. Nezumi knew he was staring at Shion, and that he probably sounded a like he was just trying to convince himself of something that wasn’t true, but he didn’t quite care. “Don’t you remember what he thought, right after we left? He’s going to wake up.”

“…Right.”

 

\--

 

Day six, they moved him back to Nezumi’s house. It was difficult getting him on the bus, and Nezumi had to lie to the driver and say Shion was asleep where he was being carried on Nezumi’s back, since it definitely looked a little bad to be carrying around an unconscious man. She was uncertain at first, but Nezumi smiled politely, and she let it go.

 

\--

 

Day seven, and Nezumi was still at home with an unconscious Shion. His manager called in the morning, asking when he was going to be back at work, as he’d made some excuse the day they went to the church about being sick. He faked a sore throat and told him it would be a little longer until he was feeling better. It seemed to placate him. Shion’s pulse was still normal.

Inukashi came by around four p.m. to make sure that Shion was still okay, and even after they’d been reassured, one of their dogs at their heel, they lingered around longer, like they were waiting for him to just wake up all of the sudden and be all right. Nezumi humored them, for lack of anything else to do, and for a vague sense of empathy in that anxious look they gave Shion’s sleeping body. Nezumi could relate, as much as he wished he couldn’t.

They ended up playing some only vaguely entertaining card game for an hour, but they only managed to fall into a normal rhythm of banter once or twice, and even then only for a few minutes, before the near lifeless form flicked into the back of both of their eyelids and they faltered, fingers twitching where they held the deck, the whispered secondhand memory of just how painful it was to be burned by those scars day after day pressing and imprinting onto their brains.

Nezumi saw Inukashi’s hand shake as they set down a card.

He pretended he hadn’t seen it.

 

\--

 

Day nine. Nothing. Inukashi came by again. They picked up one of Nezumi’s books but didn’t seem to be reading it, only looking at it, and it occurred to him that they probably didn’t know how to read.

They put it back in its place on the bookshelf, fingertips lingering on the spine.

 

\--

 

Day twelve. Rikiga barged in demanding to see Shion, because Inukashi had been ignoring his inquiries about the white-haired boy’s whereabouts for days already. Nezumi managed to get him away from the bedroom before he could see him, some sort of bribe, probably money, that he hardly remembered making afterwards.

It got the old man to leave, at least, the greedy bastard.

 

\--

 

Day thirteen. Shion stirred. It wasn’t much; his hand twitched, he took a deep, shuddering breath, still unconscious, and then fell silent and still again. Nezumi wondered if that was the first time it had happened, or if it was just the first time he caught it. Regardless, he was glad for it. It meant Shion wasn’t dead yet.

His boss called him again, saying that if he didn’t come in within the next two days, he would have no choice but to fire Nezumi. We can’t have such inconsistent actors, he had said. You can’t _still_ be sick after nearly two weeks.

Nezumi pointed out that he was the only reason the theater got any business at all, saying that without him, they would be back to another run down, bankrupt building in the middle of nowhere.

He denied this, furious, no doubt red in the face, and said that if Nezumi didn’t show up tomorrow, he’d get fired.

Nezumi hung up and fell asleep on the couch.

 

\--

 

Day fourteen. He had to go to work, and left Shion at home. When he got back that night, he fell asleep the moment his head hit the pillow.

 

\--

 

Day sixteen, Inukashi came over. Nezumi was dismissed from work earlier than usual, and got home to see Inukashi sitting on a stool next to the bed, running their hands over the pages of _Dante’s Inferno_ without really reading the words.

“Do you know how to read?” Nezumi asked, not unkindly, as he leaned against the bedroom doorframe, watching them watch Shion.

“Of course I do!” They answered, too quick and too defensive. Nezumi raised an eyebrow and shrugged a shoulder at the book in their hands.

“Go on then. If you’re so sure, prove it to me. Read the first page out loud.”

They stared at him for a moment, looking furious, before they tossed it unceremoniously onto the floor in between the two, standing up from the stool and storming out of the room. Nezumi followed, much more calmly.

“So you _can’t_ read—“

“I can read _fine,_ thank you! All you really need to know is enough to get by!”

“Keep your voice down.”

“What, like Shion’s just _magically_ gonna _wake up_ because I’m shoutin’ at you?!” They stomped their foot childishly. “Bastard! You’re always lookin’ down on me for one thing or another—you’re _not_ any better than me! Shion—” Their voice cracked at the name. They snapped their mouth shut.

The two of them stood in awkward, tense silence for a moment, Inukashi not making eye contact, glaring furiously at the wood floor like it had personally offended them. Nezumi sighed and pushed off from the door frame, going to the bookshelf and plucking one out of its nestle.

“Here,” he said, tossing it to them. They caught the book easily, looking at him like he was crazy.

“The fuck’s this for?”

“Read the first page,” he instructed, and added, upon seeing their face contort in anger, “I just wanna know how much you know. That’s all.”

“Forget it.” They tossed the book onto the coffee table behind them. “I don’t gotta deal with this from you—“

“Inukashi,” he said, and they must’ve been able to tell from the tone of his voice that he wasn’t being condescending, because they faltered. “Please, just read it.”

He knew what they were thinking, that he had never said _please_ to them before without it having some sort of mocking, cynical undertone to it. Hesitantly, they turned back around to the table, and picked the book up with unsteady hands, flipping to the first page.

They began to read, wavering and slow, stumbling over their words clumsily, mispronouncing almost all of them and leaving silence for the words they couldn’t quite understand.

 

_“Halfway along our journey to life’s end_

_I found myself astray in a dark wood…”_

\--

 

Day twenty. Shion hadn’t moved anymore than shifting and a deep breath every now and then. As it turned out, Inukashi _could_ read, sort of, but it was slow and their understanding was limited.

“I can teach you,” he said. They looked up from where they had been watching Shion, pretending they weren’t fretting over him. It was looking less and less like he would wake up.

“What?” They narrowed their eyes at him. “Teach me what?”

“How to read.”

Their ears turned red, and they huffed. “I don’t _want_ you to _teach_ me _anythin’_. I ain’t stupid, I’m fine how I am.”

“Don’t be stubborn.” He came to sit across from them on the other side of the bed. “Besides, wouldn’t it be nice to show off to Shion once he finally finishes with his cat nap?”

“I ain’t a damn _kid_ , and Shion ain’t my—my _mom_ or somethin’, I don’t have to impress him by learning a few stupid tricks!”

Nezumi sighed. “Suit yourself then. I’m going to make dinner.”

They crossed their arms, grumbling something about _that damn rat_ , and didn’t move from their spot next to Shion.

 

\--

 

Day twenty-three. Inukashi showed up at his house earlier than usual, looking determined.

“I want you to teach me,” they said.

Nezumi opened his mouth to respond.

“And before you start gettin’ all smug and whatever,” they stopped him, “it’s _not_ because of Shion. I’m not tryin’ to impress him.” Their eyes flicked away. “I just…”

The next part was mumbled, so Nezumi raised an eyebrow at them and said, “Yeah, you’re going to have to repeat that for me.”

They glared at him, face heating up in what was obviously embarrassment, and crossed their arms defiantly. “I just…I said it’s ‘cause I _wanna_ learn, okay? Now’re you gonna teach me or not?”

Nezumi sighed, faking like it was a big hassle when in reality he had hardly anything to do besides eat, sleep, and work those days. “Alright, since you asked so politely.”

 

\--

 

Day thirty-six.

“This hound will hunt that crea—creat—“

“Creature.”

“ _Creature_ high and low, until he…thrusts her back in the Inferno…wh…when…”

“Whence.”

“What the fuck kind of word is that?”

“Just read it.”

“ _Whence_ envy freed her first and let her go.”

“Good. Now the next portion. Start from ‘ _and I_ ’.”

“And I shall…lead you to a region that will always last…where—where you will hear shrieks of…”

“Despair.”

“And…”

“Grief.”

“And see the ancient—“

“ _Ancient_ , not _an-see-ant_.”

“That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard.”

“Just keep going.”

“ _Ancient—_ dumbass word—spirits in their pain…as each of them begs for their… second death. And you’ll see spirits happy in the fire…because they live in hope that they will come…sooner or later, where the…the blessed are.”

“Not bad.”

“You read the rest. This book is stupid.”

 

“ _And if you wish to join that company,_

_One worthier than I will take you up._

_I’ll leave you with her when I go away._

_That Emperor who has His kingdom there_

_Lets no one come through me into his city,_

_Because I was a rebel to his law._

_He governs all creation, ruling where_

_He has His capital and His high throne._

_Happy are those he chooses to have there!”_

 

There came the sound of feet padding on wood flooring from the room over, and both Inukashi and Nezumi froze where they had been in the middle of a lesson. They looked to each other, as some form of seeing they both weren’t making it up, and then they were slamming the book shut and all but busting the door down.

Shion was very much awake, and very much alive, looking sickly and pale, but standing on two shaking legs nonetheless. He looked around, confused for a moment, like he wasn’t quite sure where he was. His eyes were glassy, violet and bright in a way Nezumi hadn’t realized he’d missed.

“Shion…” Inukashi was the first one of them to say anything, voice so quiet it was almost a whisper, like they were afraid if they talked too loudly it would send Shion spiraling back into his sleep. “You’re—you’re _okay_ —“

“I…” The white-haired man licked his lips, looking more like a boy with his confused expression and glassy eyes, like he was going to cry. “I don’t…”

“Did it work?” They asked.

Nezumi tried to say something, a greeting maybe, or something joking like, Did you get enough rest, Your Majesty? But the words stuck to the back of his throat, refusing to come out. His lips remained sealed.

He couldn’t do anything but stare as Shion’s lips moved, forming the words, “Who are you?”

 

\--

 

_I’m sorry. I really wish I could remember who you are. You—you obviously…you obviously care about me, but I’m not sure I know who I am._

_But you remember your name._

_Yes. I’m Shion._

_Do you remember how old you are?_

_No._

_What about Rikiga? Or the town? Or the church? Washing Inukashi’s dogs?_

_No. No. I’m sorry. I don’t remember. I’m really sorry._

\--

 

_Shion?_

 

_Hmm?_

_Do you ever…do you ever hurt? Your body, I mean._

_Well…I mean…sometimes, I guess? I get headaches easily, I think._

_I’m talking about chronic pain._

_No, I don’t think I do._

_So—so your scars, they don’t…hurt?_

_No. Nezumi…why do you ask?_

_Forget it. It wasn’t important._

\--

 

“There’s not much a reason learnin’ this to show off if he don’t even remember me, huh?”

“I thought you said you were learning for yourself.”

“I am. But I _was_ kinda lookin’ forward to reading with him.”

 

\--

 

“Here. Take this.”

“I already told I don’t want—“

“It was— _is_ his favorite.”

“ _Macbeth?_ ”

“Yeah. But I have a sinking suspicion he only really liked it to appease me.”

“…Thanks, Nezumi.”

“Don’t mention it.”

 

\--

  _  
_

_Nezumi?_

 

_Yeah, I’m here._

_What was I like? Before?_

A pause. _You were…_ Another pause. _You were naïve. And blindly optimistic. You let your emotions get the best of you at the stupidest of times, and you never listened to anyone, you were so stubborn. When you were set on something, you were set on something._

_I sounded…kind of like an airhead, honestly._

He snorted, tried to choke back tears. _You got that right._

_Did you love me, Nezumi?_

He did not answer.

\--

 

_Yes, Shion. I loved you._

 

\--

 

Overlooking a hill right at the city’s limits, sits a church, abandoned and empty. It sits, untouched, withering on the inside, rotting on the out, smelling of death and shattered rosary beads, covered in dust.

Sitting inside, cross-legged at the broken altar, there is a boy, with bright white hair and a snake adorning his body. Violet hides behind closed eye lids, where he is whispering prayer to himself. Waiting patiently in one of the corroded pews is another boy, with dark hair and beautiful eyes. He watches the other leisurely, in no rush to leave this place, regardless of the memories it holds, that week he spent growing old with worry. It does not bring him a sense of sickness anymore as it used to, but instead, a feeling of nostalgia, a yearning for even then.

This white haired boy comes here to pray every day, takes the bus crowded with strangers’ ghosts and makes his way hand-in-hand with the other boy up the hill, feet light even as he feels an odd, misplaced sense of anxiety curling around his ribcage. He should not be worried, he should not be nervous, and he should not be this dreadful of the old home; but he is, and he thinks he remembers seeing it before, thinks it might have to do with who he used to be, although he can’t figure out why that is.

The other one—the dark-haired one, the cynical one—tells stories of what the two of them were like, months ago, nearly a year, what he said that day, _It’s your turn to cook_ as if that would help the situation.

We were married, he says.

Were we really? says the other.

Of course. Not officially, because we didn’t have money for rings or a ceremony, but we were married.

I loved you.

You did. You told me quite often, actually.

The white haired boy is quiet. He looks down, guilt written over his face.

You don’t have to say you love me, the other says. This version of you—you hardly know me. Don’t feel pressured to act like you do. Besides, throwing around something with as much weight as _I love you_ would be a pretty airheaded thing to do, don’t you think?

I don’t think so, he says, surprising his former lover. I don’t think that’s airheaded. I think that’s brave.

The dark-haired boy stares, eyes wide, before he laughs, long and loud and genuine, and the other thinks that he has a beautiful laugh, clear like chimes.

Even without your memories, he says, you’re still an airhead.

Am I?

Of course.

And the snake curls further around the boy, down his throat.

There will come a day, however close or far it may be, that the snake unwinds, and he is able to feel something as he walks up the church steps, something he knows is supposed to be there, and as he takes the rosary in hand, he will see flashes of a boy, no older than twelve, with silver eyes, hand around his throat, lips moving to form the words, _don’t move_.

And he will remember.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> my tumblr is calliopinaround so go scream at me abt nezushi maybe


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